Wall Street likely to shrug off Obama as investors wait for budget deal

Obama's speech provided little in the way of guidance as to whether the White House and Congress will come to a deal to head off large spending cuts that are set to come into effect as of March.

The broader market has not been overly concerned about the potential effect of $85 billion in automatic spending cuts that would hit the defense sector hard.

The president presented a number of new initiatives - including a proposal to raise the national minimum wage to $9 an hour - but the difficult path many proposals face in getting through Congress means reaction from individual shares will likely be muted.

"The State of the Union address by the president should not be impactful to the markets," said Doug Kass, founder of hedge fund Seabreeze Partners Management Inc in Palm Beach, Florida.

The equity market has rallied sharply in the first six weeks of 2013, in no small part as a result of the deal cut to avoid the "fiscal cliff" and the Republican House's subsequent decision not to use the debt ceiling as a bargaining chip for spending cuts.

Headed into the speech, S&P 500 futures were up marginally, and barely moved during the course of Obama's address.

Obama urged a resolution to the budget battle over the so-called sequester, the package of automatic spending cuts scheduled to

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