The Commerce Department releases its consumer spending report Friday, which contains a measure of inflation that's closely watched by the Fed. The Fed is has aggressively tried to turn back inflation by raising its key lending rate nine straight times, trying to cool spending by Americans.
It joined Microsoft and Alphabet, which reported better-than-expected results earlier in the week, and Amazon followed suit after trading closed for the day. The Fed has been raising rates at a furious pace since early last year, up to the highest level since 2007 from its record low to try to get price increases under control.
In its first policy meeting under its new governor, Kazuo Ueda, the BOJ kept its key policy rate at minus 0.1% even as Japan reported inflation excluding volatile fresh food costs was at 3.5% in March.