Wall Street pointed toward gains before the opening bell Wednesday as a flurry of companies report earnings. Global markets advanced after China’s central bank announced fresh measures to boost its slowing economy.
Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.4%, while futures for the Dow Jones industrials inched up 0.2%.
Earnings season is heating up with more than 50 companies are scheduled to release results later this week, including Tesla and Intel.
In early hours trading, Netflix jumped 10% after the streaming entertainment giant reported another quarter of strong subscriber growth late Tuesday. Netflix has more than 260 million global subscribers as of the end of 2023. That's an annual increase of nearly 30 million subscribers and a massive improvement over 2022’s increase of 8.9 million subscribers.
Online auction site eBay rose 3.9% after it became the latest tech company to reduce its head count, saying it will cut about 1,000 jobs, or an estimated 9% of its full-time workforce.
Dupont tumbled nearly 11% before the bell Wednesday after it gave a weaker than expected forecast and AT&T fell 4% after its fourth-quarter profit fell short of Wall Street targets.
Analysts have forecast companies in the S&P 500 will deliver weaker overall earnings per share than a year earlier, which would be the fourth such decline in the last five quarters, according to FactSet. But stocks have still rallied to records in anticipation that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates several times this year.
Such cuts can boost prices for investments while relaxing the pressure on the economy and financial system.
Treasury yields have already eased considerably since the autumn on expectations for coming rate cuts, though critics warn traders may have gone overboard again in forecasting how many cuts will come and how soon the Fed will begin.
Hong Kong’s benchmark rose after the People’s Bank of China said it would cut its reserve ratio requirement by 0.5 percentage points as of Feb. 5, putting an additional 1 trillion yuan ($141 billion) into the economy. Chinese markets have languished in recent weeks, adding to concerns that investors had grown too gloomy as the country's recovery from the pandemic-related shocks faltered.
Also Wednesday, the vice chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, Wang Jiangjun, called for better protections for investors and for instilling confidence in the potential for gains in the markets, which have faltered in recent months.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng surged 3.6% to 15,899.87, helped by gains in technology companies like e-commerce giant Alibaba, which surged 5.5%.
The Shanghai Composite index recovered from early losses, climbing 1.8% to 2,820.77.
Also Wednesday, Japan reported its exports rose almost 10%, supported by strong demand for machinery, vehicles and semiconductors.
But economists are forecasting that the revival in export growth will be short-lived.
Tokyo's Nikkei 225 index lost 0.8% to 36,226.48 as investors renewed speculation that the Bank of Japan is edging toward a change in its longstanding lax monetary policies, which have flooded the markets with ample cash.
In South Korea, the Kospi fell 0.4%, to 2,469.69. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 edged 0.1% higher to 7,519.20.
India's Sensex lost 0.1%, while the SET in Bangkok advanced 0.2%.
At midday in Europe, Germany’s DAX gained 1.3%, the CAC 40 in Paris was up 0.9% and Britain’s FTSE 100 rose 0.3%.
In other trading Wednesday, U.S. benchmark crude oil fell 21 cents to $74.16 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It gave up 39 cents on Tuesday.
Brent crude, the international standard, lost 29 cents to $79.26 per barrel.
The U.S. dollar slipped to 147.32 Japanese yen from 148.38 yen. The euro rose to $1.0890 from $1.0855.
On Tuesday, the S&P 500 climbed to another record, gaining 0.3% to 4,864.60 as the earnings reporting season for big U.S. companies gathered pace.
The Nasdaq composite also climbed, up 0.4%. But the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 0.3%, a day after topping 38,000 for the first time.
