Stock futures soar
U.S. stock futures were pointing to a positive start for Wall Street on Thursday as market participants looked forward to a flurry of earnings reports and a speech by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.
Several big names will report quarterly earnings today, including the likes of Snap (NYSE: SNAP), American Airlines (NASDAQ: AAL), PPG Industries (NYSE: PPG), AT&T (NYSE: T), Blackstone (NYSE: BX), Xerox (NASDAQ: XRX), and Philip Morris (NYSE: PM).
Traders will also be watching to see if Powell will further cement the case for aggressive interest rate hikes through year end, when speaks at the International Monetary Fund debate on global economy from 1 p.m. ET.
At around 5:30 a.m. ET, futures for the Dow edged up 208 points, or 0.59% to 35,287. S&P 500 futures gained 34.5 points, or 0.77% to 4,490 while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures jumped 153.25 points, or 1.09% to 14,158.
Tesla surges on blockbuster quarterly earnings
Shares in Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) staged a rally in the premarket trading session on Thursday following a stellar first-quarter earnings report.
The electric-vehicle maker announced late Wednesday that it earned a record $3.22 per share in the first three months of the year. Analysts had called for earnings of $2.20 per share.
Revenue stood at $18.76 billion, up about 80% from last year and above estimates of $17.80 billion.
CEO Elon Musk said during the company’s earnings call that the company remains “confident of 50% growth in vehicle production in 2022 versus 2021.”
He, however, warned that supply chain challenges from the Covid-19 pandemic will persist throughout the year.
Tesla stock was marked $66.91, or 6.85% higher to $1,044.11 per share in premarket hours.
Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square dumps Netflix stake
Meanwhile, famed stock picker William Ackman of Pershing Square sold his entire Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX) stake on Wednesday as the stock’s rout deepened.
Pershing Square had accumulated more than 3.1 million shares worth about $1.1 billion in January. The hedge fund said in a letter addressed to investors that it has offloaded all the shares, incurring a loss of roughly $435 million according to calculations by Bloomberg.
The sale came a day after Netflix announced that it had lost 200,000 subscribers in the first quarter, sending its shares down 35% on Wednesday.
Ackman said the business model changes Netflix proposed following its disastrous earnings report made sense, they would make the streaming giant too unpredictable in the short term.
As of writing Netflix shares were down 1.41% to $223.01 apiece in the premarket trading session.
