Investing.com - Wall Street futures pointed to a flat open on Tuesday as investors continued to chew over earnings and waited for data on consumer confidence.
The blue-chip Dow futures gained 16 points, or 0.09%, by 7:07AM ET (11:07GMT), the S&P 500 futures inched up less than a point, or 0.01%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures edged forward 5 points, or 0.10%.
The earnings season stateside has been enormously positive with about 80% of those S&P firms reporting so far having beat consensus profit estimates.
“If you recall, last year S&P EPS (earnings-per-share) growth was decelerating and EPS estimate trends were weakening. (They’re) doing just the opposite this year”, The Earnings Scout pointed out.
Tuesday will be a busy day for numbers from Dow components.
Visa Inc (NYSE:V) was set to price in earnings reported after the bell a day earlier. Shares in the blue-chip credit card company fell more than 1% in pre-market trade despite having registered a 47.1% increase in total payments volume.
Du Pont (NYSE:DD) reported EPS of $0.34 that beat the $0.21 consensus number Tuesday, although focus appeared to be on the fact that its net income attributable to shareholders broke even on a per share basis.
Merck (NYSE:MRK) surged more than 2% after the second-largest U.S. drug maker beat on both the top and bottom line.
United Technologies (NYSE:UTX) reported a 4.1% increase in revenue that helped its EPS beat estimates by $0.10.
Procter & Gamble (NYSE:PG) saw revenue slip less than feared with an EPS of $1.03 settling five cents above analyst forecasts.
Still up to bat, 3M (NYSE:MMM) and Caterpillar (NYSE:CAT) were also among members of the blue-chip index scheduled to report before the opening bell on Tuesday, while the focus will be Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) after the close.
In the last case, the largest U.S. firm by market capitalization will offer the first peek into sales of the new iPhone 7. Analysts expect the iPhone maker to post earnings of $1.65 a share on revenue of $46.89 billion for the quarter.
Leaving out the deluge of S&P firms that report Tuesday, The Earnings Scout suggested that they are showing accelerating growth this year in both sales and earnings that are accompanied with ‘less bad’ EPS estimate cuts and interpret that to mean that “the Fed has its window to hike”.
In that light, attention will also focus on Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart who is scheduled to speak at 1:20PM ET (17:20GMT) on lending and investing in community development. Fed speakers will then be in a quiet period ahead of the central bank's meeting next week.
On the economic calendar, rate hike expectations could also shift with Tuesday’s spotlight on the U.S. consumer confidence, as investors attempt to gauge if the world's largest economy is strong enough to withstand an increase in borrowing costs before the end of the year.
The Conference Board will publish October consumer confidence figures at 10:00AM ET (14:00GMT). Analysts expect the index to tick down to 101.0 from 104.1 in September.
There is also August home price indexes from S&P Case-Shiller and the Federal Housing Finance Agency both due at 9:00AM ET (13:00GMT). The Richmond Fed survey is also due Tuesday morning.
With analysts insisting that the Fed is unlikely to move on rates next week due to the U.S. presidential elections just six days after the policy announcement, traders are currently pricing in around a 78% chance of a rate hike at the Fed's December meeting, according to Investing.com's Fed Rate Monitor Tool.
Meanwhile, oil prices moved higher in choppy trade on Tuesday, as investors continued to watch developments in OPEC’s dealings to reach an agreement on curbing output. A committee including non-OPEC member Russia was scheduled to meet in Vienna on Friday and Saturday in order to hammer out the details of the proposal to be discussed at OPEC’s official meeting on November 30.
The private American Petroleum Institute (API) is due to publish its weekly crude stocks estimates later on Tuesday, followed by the official Energy Information Administration (EIA) data due on Wednesday.
U.S. crude futures traded up 0.40% to $50.72 by 7:09AM ET (11:09GMT), while Brent oil gained 0.17% to $51.55.