Nasdaq futures fall to 31,072 before bank earnings

Nasdaq futures were lower at 31,072 in premarket trading on Oct. 12 while S&P 500 futures were slightly higher at 7,864.50, The Economic Times reported in an Oct. 11 news article.

LSEG IBES data showed S&P 500 earnings are expected to rise 30.6% in the third quarter, before Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase report on Tuesday, the article said.

Futures split

Dow Jones futures stood at 51,948 and Russell 2000 futures at 2,821. The US stock market was open for Columbus Day, also referred to as Indigenous Peoples’ Day, while the US Treasury market was closed on Oct. 12.

The holiday closure left equities without a live Treasury-market signal after yields had climbed to 24-year highs earlier in October. Higher energy prices were a focus because they can keep inflation firm and weigh on equity valuations.

The S&P 500, Dow Jones and Russell 2000 ended higher last week, according to the article. It attributed the gains to optimism around AI-related third-quarter earnings and hopes that the Federal Reserve may avoid near-term rate increases.

Oil and rates

Oil moved between gains and losses after President Donald Trump said Ukraine and Russia had agreed to stop targeting each other’s energy facilities following a US diesel-supply arrangement with Moscow. The article said details of the agreement were unclear and that the plan faced opposition in Washington.

Chris Beauchamp, chief market analyst at IG, linked the oil backdrop to market sentiment. “Any hope that Trump's deal with Putin might help bring down prices has been negated by the flare-up in the Houthi conflict,” he said.

“While earnings season will be a key driver this week, investors should expect oil news to keep making headlines, weighing heavily on sentiment,” Beauchamp said. Brent crude remained above $100 a barrel as the Middle East conflict continued to affect sentiment.

Markets were pricing a 19% probability that the Federal Reserve would raise rates this month, CME’s FedWatch tool showed. That pricing matters for equities because higher policy-rate expectations can raise the discount rate applied to future earnings.

The US dollar rose to 158.43 yen from 158.23 yen in early Monday dealings, while the euro was unchanged at $1.1191. The article did not give a comparable move for US equity cash trading because the figures cited were from premarket futures.

AI stocks

Nvidia contributed almost 2% to the S&P 500’s gain this year, while Apple, Micron and Advanced Micro Devices each added more than 1%, according to the article. Tesla’s 15% decline this year subtracted about 0.3% from the index rally.

The concentration matters because index-level gains can depend heavily on a narrow group of large technology shares. The article described Nvidia as the world’s most valuable company and identified it as an AI chipmaker.

IREN shares jumped 5.4% in premarket trading after The Information reported Anthropic had entered a multi-year cloud deal with the data-center firm. The article did not provide financial terms for the reported agreement.

What to watch

Tuesday: Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase are scheduled to open the US bank earnings season. Their results will be an early test of whether the third-quarter earnings season supports the LSEG IBES growth estimate.

This week: US consumer-price, producer-price and retail-sales figures are due. Headline CPI is expected to rise 0.6% on the month and 3.7% annually, while core inflation is expected to rise 0.2% monthly and 2.5% annually.

Source: News article, The Economic Times, Oct. 11, 2026