US pre-open: Futures tick higher following record closes for S&P 500 and Nasdaq

(Sharecast News) - Wall Street futures were slightly higher ahead of the bell on Thursday following yesterday's record closes for the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite. As of 1245 BST, Dow Jones futures were up 0.08%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures had the indices opening 0.05% and 0.11% firmer, respectively.

The Dow closed 72.27 points lower on Wednesday, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq logged new record closing highs despite ongoing geopolitical uncertainty, as another strong round of bank earnings lifted sentiment.

Major indices looked set to continue their recent rally prior to the open on Thursday as hopes for a potential peace deal between Washington and Tehran continued to build after Donald Trump said the Iran war was "very close to over", claiming the Middle Eastern nation wanted to "make a deal very badly".

A White House official told CNBC that a second round of negotiations was under discussion, though nothing had yet been formally scheduled, with improving sentiment helping the S&P 500 erase all of its losses since the start of the conflict earlier in the week.

Trade Nation's David Morrison said: "Both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq posted fresh record closing highs last night, as stocks within the tech sector experienced high demand. 'Magnificent Seven' corporations have been on an absolute tear since the end of March, as have semiconductors, and even the major investment banks have joined in, despite some mixed first quarter results.

"Investors piled back in to 'buy the dip', repeating a behaviour that has proved consistently profitable since October 2022. There was always an expectation that the war would be relatively short. The consensus view was that it would be longer than a fortnight but was likely to be over by the end of April. Expectations are certainly high that a peace deal between Washington and Tehran could soon materialise."

In the corporate space, PepsiCo, US Bancorp and Bank of New York Mellon were slated to release their latest quarterly earnings before the open, while streaming giant Netflix will publish its Q1 numbers after the close.

On the macro front, weekly jobless claims from the Department of Labor will be out at 1330 BST, as will April's Philly Fed manufacturing survey, while March capacity utilisation and industrial production figures will follow at 1415 BST.





Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com