Stock futures higher as investors await earnings

[October 20, 2008]  NEW YORK (AP) -- Wall Street headed for a higher open Monday as investors cheered signs that global credit markets are thawing even as they awaited a batch of quarterly earnings to see how companies are weathering the financial crisis.

After the extreme volatility of trading over the past two weeks, investors are looking for some signs that a bottom has been reached and that normalcy will return to edgy financial markets.

Companies from sectors including credit cards, defense, energy and technology all report third-quarter earnings Monday, giving investors some idea of whether the U.S. faces a short economic downturn or a deep and protracted recession. Earnings from American Express Co., Halliburton Co., Lockheed Martin Corp. and Texas Instruments Inc. are due later in the day.

But analysts say the earnings reports are mostly backward looking and note that companies' expectations about how they'll perform going forward will be more telling.

Ahead of the market's open and the release of earnings reports, Dow Jones industrial average futures rose 251, or 2.86 percent, to 9,022. On Friday, the Dow ended 127 points lower after another back-and-forth session that has characterized recent trading, the volatility was markedly less.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index futures rose 25.40, or 2.72 percent, to 958.90 and the Nasdaq 100 index futures rose 33.75, or 2.57 percent, to 1,344.75.

Strains in credit markets continued showing signs of easing after a raft of bailout measures by governments around the world, including a joint U.S. and European plan to buy stakes in private banks to boost their lending. Demand for Treasury bills, regarded as the safest assets around, lessened Monday but remained relatively high in a sign that there was still much fear in the markets.

The three-month Treasury bill Monday yielded 0.80 percent, little changed from 0.82 percent late Friday. That's better than the 20 percent of last Wednesday, but the yield but has not surpassed 1 percent in more than a week.

The dollar was lower against other major currencies, while gold prices rose.

Investors will also be waiting for comments from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who is scheduled to appear Monday before the House Budget Committee to give lawmakers an update on the financial crisis. Bernanke is likely to once again put the country on notice that there won't be a quick fix while potentially leaving the door open for further interest rate cuts to provide some relief.

Light, sweet crude was up $1.78 to $73.63 a barrel in premarket electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Last week, it sank to an almost 16-month low on worries about a deep global recession obliterating fuel demand.

Financial markets overseas were higher.

Japan's Nikkei stock average was up 3.59 percent. Britain's FTSE 100 was up 2.09 percent, Germany's DAX index was up 1.95 percent, and France's CAC-40 was up 1.78 percent.

[Associated Press; By STEVENSON JACOBS]

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