published Dec 23, 2018 6:28:28 PM, by Vildana Hajric and Elena Popina (Bloomberg) —

U.S. stock futures were mixed, signaling the S&P 500 may get a reprieve from a months-long rout as investors speculated the chaos gripping Washington won’t spill over into the economy.

Contracts on the S&P 500 retreated 0.1 percent at 7:28 p.m. in New York, looking to snap a seven-day slide that is already the the longest losing streak of the year. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures slid 37 points, while Nasdaq 100 contracts lost 0.2 percent. U.S. equity markets will close early Monday ahead of the Christmas holiday.

Investors rattled by the sell-off in American equities looked for a break ahead of the holidays even as tumult continues to lash markets. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin sought to reassure markets over the weekend that President Donald Trump does not intend to oust Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, a report that shook Wall Street already perturbed by the trade war, rising interest rates and the government shutdown.

“If the futures were down 2 percent, it would’ve been more of the concern,” Michael Antonelli, equity sales trader at Robert W. Baird. “Liquidity is thin, half of the world is on holiday, there are fewer participants in the market. Most of the world wouldn’t be paying attention today or tomorrow. You can’t get a lot of weight to the move you see right now.”

Losses on the equities markets have been unrelenting. In a year of big reversals, stocks just notched their worst week since 2011, with the S&P 500 falling 7.1 percent and the Nasdaq Composite descending into a bear market. Equally troubling was the sheer volume descending on exchanges during a typically sleepy stretch ahead of the holidays. The current sell-off has now lasted 13 weeks, and just featured declines of greater than 1.5 percent in five of the last six days.

Word Trump has discussed firing Powell went down poorly over the weekend on Wall Street, a place not known for its sympathy with Powell’s policies. While the Fed’s program of pushing up borrowing costs even as inflation expectations ease has been blamed for exacerbating and even causing the meltdown in equities, most investors saw the prospect of ousting Powell as ill-advised meddling that could sow more agitation a market that just saw volatility surge to a 10-month high.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin moved to reassure markets late Saturday that Powell wouldn’t be ousted, after four people familiar with the matter said Trump has repeatedly discussed firing the central bank chief in recent days. White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney on Sunday echoed the comments.

Fed angst was at the center of last week’s market cyclone, in which the S&P 500 tumbled 7.1 percent and the Nasdaq Composite Index became the biggest U.S. equity gauge to enter a bear market since the financial crisis. The Federal Open Market Committee raised interest rates for the fourth time this year on Wednesday and Powell downplayed the role of market turbulence in setting policy, disappointing bulls who hoped for broader acknowledgement of their plight.

Concerns about an escalating U.S. trade war with China have hurt stocks in recent weeks, and Trump has also entwined his trade war with Fed policy. In a statement on Saturday attributed to the president that was tweeted by Mnuchin, Trump said current Fed policy was terrible “especially in light of my major trade negotiations which are ongoing.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Vildana Hajric in New York at vhajric1@bloomberg.net ;Elena Popina in New York at epopina@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jeremy Herron at jherron8@bloomberg.net copyright © 2018 Bloomberg L.P