US pre-open: Stocks to edge up as earnings season kicks off
US futures pointed to a firmer open on Wall Street on Tuesday as the start of earnings season provided a welcome distraction from recent trade war concerns.
At 1210 BST, Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq futures were up 0.2%, while S&P 500 futures were 0.1% higher.
Konstantinos Anthis, head of research at ADSS, said: "With the prospect of a positive earnings' season ahead of us, investors seem to have forgotten the threat of further trade tensions so we remain optimistic for the short term. Dow Jones hit our first area of interest at the 24,800 points level and we could now see an extension towards 25,000 points again."
In corporate news, PepsiCo looked set to gain at the open after its second-quarter earnings beat analysts' expectations.
Meanwhile, Twenty-First Century Fox was likely to be in focus following a Financial Times report that it's preparing to counter Comcast's latest offer for London-listed broadcaster Sky with a new and improved bid.
As earnings season gets into full swing, this week will see earnings from banking giants JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Citigroup on Friday.
Earlier, the latest survey from the National Federation of Independent Business revealed that activity among small firms dipped a touch in June. The NFIB business optimism index slipped to 107.2 from 107.8 in May, but remained historically high and was above the 106.9 economists had pencilled in.
Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said: "The decline in the headline index mostly is due to small falls in the expectations components - economy, sales, and earnings - though they all remain quite high. Capex intentions dipped a point, and remain below last August's cycle high, despite the business tax cuts passed in December. The upward trend in earnings expectations, though, should lift capex plans to new highs over the next few months. The labour market numbers - released last week, ahead of the main report - mostly tightened further, with the jobs-hard-to-fill reading rising three points to 36, matching the all-time high recorded in November 2000.
"This unambiguously points to faster wage growth. Finally, selling price expectations dropped five points to 14, reversing the May spike. It's now consistent with little change in core inflation, net, over the next year, though it has recently under-predicted the official data."
Still to come on the data front, JOLTS job openings are at 1500 BST.