US stocks tread water during opening hour of trade

A day after the Dow Jones Industrial Average conquered the historic 22K milestone, major US equity indices witnessed a subdued opening and tread water during the early minutes of trading on Thursday. 

All the three major indices held near previous session's closing level as investors seemed to hold back from placing any aggressive bets ahead of the keenly watched US monthly jobs report, popularly known as NFP, which has the tendency to trigger a bout of volatility across global financial markets.

Despite the growing skepticism over the US President Donald Trump's ability to deliver on his promised tax reforms and huge infrastructure spending, the markets continued with its record breaking run and the move has been primarily driven by favorable second-quarter earnings reports, which seems to be providing some valuation comfort at all time high levels. 

Ahead of the key NFP print, data released on Thursday showed weekly jobless claims fell to 24K for the week ended July 29 and continued reflecting the underlying strength in the US labor market.