The big 3 indexes closed higher yesterday with all of them finishing in the green.

They hit their best levels early in the morning and drifted from there. But firmed up again in the afternoon. They pared gains, once again, shortly after the FOMC Minutes came out. But then quickly recovered to finish the day with moderate gains.

The October Minutes showed that there was less support for another rate cut this year than expected. While the Fed seemed to pivot toward labor market risk vs. inflation risk at the prior meeting, inflation concerns remained, and influenced some outlooks. The minutes showed "strongly differing views," on how to move forward in December.

Nonetheless, there were those who still see a December cut as the best course of action.

Complicating matters is the lack of visibility on the labor market and inflation due to the government shutdown. Gladly that has ended. And we'll get inflation data and jobs data prior to their next FOMC meeting on December 9-10.

As for jobs data, we are expected to get the Employment Situation report this morning for September. Although, that will now be 2 months old. And it's possible we might never get the data for October. We might. But that has yet to be determined.

Will a softer jobs number rally the market, as it could underscore the need for another rate cut? Or could a softer number spook the market, stoking worries of an economic slowdown? What about a stronger jobs market? Or will none of it matter because it's too old?

We'll soon find out.

After the close yesterday, we got the long awaited NVIDIA earnings report. They posted a positive EPS surprise of 4.84%, and a positive sales surprise of 4.14%. That translated to a quarterly EPS growth rate of 60.5% vs. this time last year, and a sales growth of 62.5%. They were up 2.85% in the regular session before earnings, and were up by roughly 4% following earnings in after-hours.

The major indexes were also tracking higher in after-hours trade with the S&P up by nearly 1%, and the Nasdaq up by roughly 1.5%.

In other news, yesterday's MBA Mortgage Applications were down by -5.2% w/w, with purchases off -2.3%, and refi's off -7.3%.

And the Atlanta Fed Business Inflation Expectations eased to 2.2% y/y vs. last month's pace of 2.3%.

In addition to the delayed jobs report this morning, we'll also get Weekly Jobless Claims, Existing Homes Sales, Leading Indicators, the Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index, the Quarterly Services Survey, and the Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Index.

With 2 days left, the major indexes are still underwater for the week.

But a decent day or two could easily put them in the plus column by week's end.

See you tomorrow,