BLBG: U.S. Index Futures Signal Stock Rebound on Amazon, Visa Earnings
U.S. stock-index futures climbed, indicating equities will rebound after three days of losses, as Amazon.com Inc. and Visa Inc. reported better-than-expected results.
Amazon surged 18 percent in early New York trading after posting a surprise second-quarter profit on top of sales that beat analysts’ estimates. Visa Inc. rallied 4.5 percent after saying it expects to complete talks to acquire Visa Europe Ltd. by the end of October, and reporting profit that beat predictions. Juniper Networks Inc. jumped 9.7 percent after forecasting earnings that exceed estimates.
Standard & Poor’s 500 Index E-mini contracts expiring in September added 0.2 percent to 2,103 at 6:30 a.m. in New York. The benchmark gauge has lost 1.2 percent this week and is headed toward its fourth weekly decline out of five. Contracts on the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 22 points, or 0.1 percent, to 17,698. Stocks fell Thursday as results from 3M Co. and Caterpillar Inc. disappointed investors and commodities slid.
“To trigger the next move up, investors will have to go back to risk-on mode,” said Guillermo Hernandez Sampere, who helps manage about 150 million euros ($164 million) as head of trading at MPPM EK in Eppstein, Germany. “The reporting season so far hasn’t been disappointing, apart from some tech high fliers. We should see a switch into more interest-rate sensitive stocks.”
State Street Corp. and Biogen Inc. are among 15 companies reporting quarterly results Friday. Analysts now call for a 5.3 percent drop in second-quarter profit for S&P 500 companies, shallower than July 10 estimates for a 6.4 percent decline.
Economic Data
Investors are also watching economic reports for clues on when the Federal Reserve will start raising rates. Data at 9:45 a.m. in Washington may show the Markit Economics preliminary index of U.S. manufacturing held in July at a level indicating expansion. A separate release at 10 a.m. may show new home sales increased at a faster annualized pace in June than the prior month, according to forecasts.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg continued to put the odds for a September rate increase at 50 percent, even after Greece and China temporarily rocked markets.
Starbucks Corp. climbed 4.3 percent after the world’s biggest coffee-shop chain posted a 22 percent increase in quarterly profit. TripAdvisor Inc. sank 8.2 percent after earnings and sales fell short of projections.
