Eyes on weekly jobless claims
U.S. stock futures were mildly higher on Thursday morning, as market participants awaited weekly jobless claims data.
By 5:20 a.m. ET, futures tied to the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 78 points, or 0.25% to 31,406.
S&P 500 index futures jumped 11.62 points, or 0.3% to 3,914.62 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures surged 67.5 points, or 0.49% to 13,711.
Markets closed mixed on Wednesday, with the Dow gaining 0.2% to 31,437.80, the S&P 500 index slipping 0.03% to 3,909.90 and the Nasdaq 100 index falling 0.25% to 13,972.53.
The U.S. Department of Labor will release its latest weekly jobless report at 8:30 a.m. ET.
Powell says the U.S. labor market is “a long way” from healthy
Meanwhile, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said on Wednesday that the U.S. employment picture is “a long way” from where it needs to be, and that weakness will weigh on the Fed’s monetary policy going forward.
Powell, who spoke at an event organized by the Economic Club of New York, said the unemployment rate is closer to 10% than the 6.3% figure reported by the Labor Department last week.
He said that highlights the need for a “society-wide commitment” to get Americans back to work.
TikTok U.S. deal with Walmart, Oracle shelved indefinitely
In other news, TikTok’s forced sale to Walmart (NYSE: WMT) and Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) has been put on hold as the Biden administration reviews potential national security risks posed by Chinese tech firms initiated under President Trump.
According to a report by the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday, the administration will determine its own path forward on how to deal with security risks posed by the popular video app pertaining to how the personal information of American users is stored and whether it falls into the hands of the Chinese government.
Trump had ordered TikTok, which is owned by China’s ByteDance, be sold to a U.S. company last year, citing national security concerns about American users’ data being accessed by Chinese authorities.
Uber tumbles on revenue miss; Disney set to report
On the earnings front, shares of Uber (NYSE: UBER) fell 3.45% to $61 in pre-market trading after the company late Wednesday reported a narrower fourth-quarter loss, while revenue fell short of expectations.
The ride hailing giant said fourth-quarter revenue dropped 16% to $3.16 billion, while net loss for the period came in at $968 million, down from $1.09 billion in the same period last year.
Notable earnings to watch today include Disney (NYSE: DIS), AstraZeneca (NASDAQ: AZN), Kraft Heinz (NASDAQ: KHC), Tyson Foods (NYSE: TSN), PepsiCo (NASDAQ: PEP), Aurora Cannabis (NYSE: ACB), and Expedia Group (NASDAQ: EXPE).
