traders work on the floor of the new york stock exchange nyse on december 08 2021 in new york city us stock futures rose early monday morning as wall street looked to start off 2022 on solid footing futures tied to the dow jones industrial average rose 104 points or about 03 those for the sp 500 advanced 032 and nasdaq 100 gained about 04 the move in futures comes after markets closed out a strong 2021 last week the sp 500 rose nearly 27 for the year with the nasdaq composite and dow also posting large returns stocks fell slightly on friday but the sp 500 and dow were positive for the final week of the year the new year starts with continued uncertainty around the covid19 pandemic the rise of the omicron variant helped lead to thousands of flight cancellations during the holiday season and has led some businesses and schools to consider temporary closures several major wall street banks have asked employees to work from home for the first few weeks of january infectious disease expert dr anthony fauci told abcs this week on sunday that us health officials may soon update guidelines to include a testing recommendation to signal when a person who previously tested positive for covid can leave isolation inflation and monetary policy are also expected to be key themes for 2022 as investors expect the federal reserve to hike rates multiple times in the coming year to help cool the rise in prices for consumers