By STAN CHOE, Associated Press Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street remains listless on Thursday, as the countdown ticks toward Friday’s highly anticipated jobs report.

The S&P 500 was edging up by 0.1% in early trading. After sprinting through May and rallying within a couple good days’ worth of gains of its all-time high, the index at the center of many 401(k) accounts has lost momentum as financial markets wait for the next big trigger to move, up or down.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 10 points, or less than 0.1%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.2% higher.

Trading activity in options markets suggests investors believe the next big move for the S&P 500 could come on Friday, when the U.S. Labor Department will say how many more jobs U.S. employers created than destroyed during May. The expectation on Wall Street is for a slowdown in hiring from April.

A resilient job market has been one of the linchpins that’s propped up the U.S. economy, and the worry is that all the uncertainty created by President Donald Trump’s on-and-off tariffs could cause businesses to freeze their hiring.

A report on Thursday said that more U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week than economists expected. It still remains relatively low compared with history, but it hit its highest level in eight months.

A separate report said that U.S. workers overall produced less stuff per hour during the start of the year than economists expected. The drop in productivity is a potentially discouraging trend for inflation.

On Wall Street, Five Below rallied 9.9% after the retailer, which sells products priced between $1 and $5, reported a stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Winnie Park credited broad-based strength across most of its merchandise.

MongoDB jumped 16.6% after the database company likewise delivered a stronger profit than analysts expected.

On the losing side of Wall Street was Brown-Forman, the company behind Jack Daniel’s and Woodford Reserve. Its profit and revenue for the latest quarter fell short of Wall Street’s expectations, and the company said it expects its upcoming fiscal year to be challenging because of “consumer uncertainty, the potential impact from currently unknown tariffs” and other potential challenges. Its stock fell 15.7%.

The CEO of PVH, the company behind the Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger brands, likewise cited challenges from “an increasingly uncertain consumer and macroeconomic backdrop.”

Its stock fell 16.3% even though it reported stronger revenue and profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The company cut its profit forecast for its full fiscal year, saying it will likely be able to offset only some of the potential hit it will take because of tariffs.

Hopes that Trump would lower his tariffs after reaching trade deals with other countries have been among the main reasons the S&P 500 has rallied back after dropping roughly 20% below its record two months ago. But talks are still ongoing, and nothing is assured. In the meantime, many companies have been cutting or withdrawing their forecasts for profit this upcoming year because of all the uncertainty.

Trump spoke with China’s leader, Xi Jinping, on Thursday as the world hopes for progress between its two largest economies. The conversation was confirmed by the Chinese foreign ministry, which said Trump initiated the call. The White House did not immediately comment.

Expectations are also building that the Federal Reserve will need to cut interest rates later this year in order to prop up the economy. Yields took a sharp turn lower on Wednesday after reports came in weaker than expected on the U.S. job market and on activity among U.S. services businesses.

The Fed has yet to cut interest rates this year after slashing them through the end of 2024. Part of the reason for the pause is that the Fed wants to see how much Trump’s tariffs will hurt the economy and raise inflation. While lower interest rates could boost the economy, they also tend to give inflation more fuel.

In the bond market, Treasury yields were a bit steadier on Thursday ahead of Friday’s jobs report. The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 4.35% from 4.37% late Wednesday and from 4.46% the day before that.

In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed across much of Europe and Asia.

South Korea’s Kospi jumped 1.5% for one of the biggest moves after the country’s new president and leading liberal politician Lee Jae-myung began his term, vowing to restart talks with North Korea and beef up a trilateral partnership with the U.S. and Japan.

AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed.