By Shreyashi Sanyal
(Reuters) – U.S. stock index futures rose on Tuesday as an upbeat profit forecast from Johnson & Johnson added to the positive momentum in corporate earnings generated by big banks last week.
Johnson & Johnson’s shares rose 1.7% after it raised its 2021 adjusted profit forecast, even as it stuck to its outlook of $2.5 billion in sales from its COVID-19 vaccine this year.
Walmart Inc’s shares rose 2% after Goldman Sachs added the world’s largest retailer to its “Americas Conviction List”.
Large-cap technology and communications companies including Facebook Inc, Apple Inc, Amazon.com Inc, Alphabet Inc and Microsoft Corp all rose between 0.3% and 0.7%. Netflix Inc rose 0.1% ahead of its quarterly results later in the day.
After forecast-beating results from big banks last week set a positive tone for this earnings season, investors now turn to results from companies that are more exposed to supply chain constraints, price rises and labor shortages.
Travelers Cos Inc rose 2.7% after the property and casualty insurer beat estimates for third-quarter profit.
The S&P 500 index is 1.3% away from a record-high hit in early September, as investors now hope that a continuous flow of better-than-expected earnings reports could push the market to new highs.
“Should we have another solid week of results, this may inject S&P 500 bulls with enough confidence to venture into uncharted territory beyond its all-time high,” wrote Lukman Otunuga, senior research analyst at FXTM in a client note.
Analysts now expect S&P 500 earnings to show a 32% rise from a year ago, according to Refinitiv data.
At 6:51 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 147 points, or 0.42%, S&P 500 e-minis were up 20 points, or 0.45%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 51.5 points, or 0.34%.
(Reporting by Shreyashi Sanyal in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)
