News

(Reuters) – U.S. stock index futures rose on Thursday ahead of weekly jobless claims and retail sales data as positive earnings reports from companies including Bank of America and BlackRock bolstered hopes of a rebound in profit growth.

Bank of America Corp rose 1.3% in premarket trading after reporting a jump in first-quarter profit that breezed past estimates as it released reserves it had set aside to cover potential coronavirus loan losses.

Top U.S. banks kicked off first-quarter reporting season on Wednesday, with Goldman Sachs Group Inc, JPMorgan Chase & Co and Wells Fargo & Co posting bumper results.

BlackRock Inc, the world’s largest asset manager, reported a 16% jump in first-quarter profit as investors poured more money into its diverse funds and fee revenue jumped.

Most high-flying technology stocks rebounded from a drop in the previous session, with Apple Inc, Microsoft Corp Facebook Inc and Amazon.com Inc rising between 0.5% and 1%.

The newly-listed cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase jumped 8.8%, a day after going public in a high-profile debut on the Nasdaq that briefly valued it at more than $100 billion.

Meanwhile, official data is likely to show the number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits slipped last week. It comes after the initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased unexpectedly by 16,000 in the previous week.

U.S. retail sales data for March is expected at 8.30 ET. Economists polled by Reuters forecast a 5.9% rise, month-on-month.

At 6:51 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 158 points, or 0.47%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 19.75 points, or 0.48%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 88.75 points, or 0.64%.

Dell Technologies Inc rose 8.5%, as brokerages Evercore and Credit Suisse raised price targets, after the company said it would spin off its 81% stake in cloud computing software maker VMware, creating two standalone public companies.