US pre-open: Stock futures higher on interest rate optimism

The Federal Reserve’s decision to keep interest rate unchanged continued to have a positive impact on markets on Friday, pushing US stock futures higher on Friday.

The Fed, announced its policy decision on Wednesday, vowing to keep rates near zero for a considerable time after ending bond purchases. The central bank reduced its bond-buying by $10bn to $15bn a month, as expected, and said it continues to see a rate increase by early 2015.

On Friday’s agenda, a report in Washington is forecast to show that a gauge on the outlook for the US economy for the next three to six months rose at a slower pace in August. The Conference Board’s index of leading indicators is expected to increase 0.4%, following a 0.9% gain in July.

Yahoo! rallied after Alibaba raised $21.8bn in the US in an initial public offering (IPO). Alibaba, Yahoo and other shareholders sold 320.1m shares for $68 each.

Concur Technologies jumped after SAP agreed to pay $129 a share for the cloud-software company that manages corporate travel and expenses.

AMD advanced after the chipmaker signed a multi-year agreement with Synopsys that gives each access to the other’s technologies.

Apple´s new iPhone 6 is set to go on sale starting today. Analysts at Goldman Sachs believe that the sales of the new gadget may increase US retail sales during the month by between 0.1 and 0.7 percentage points.

Shares of Oracle are being called 1.53% lower after reporting lower than expected earnings per share and revenues for its first fiscal quarter.

West Texas Intermediate crude futures fell 0.34% to $92.75 per barrel, according to the ICE.