Futures fall on Middle East worries; earnings, data in focus
By Ankika Biswas and Shashwat Chauhan
(Reuters) -Futures for Wall Street's main indexes fell on Tuesday as investors assessed diplomatic efforts to contain the Middle East conflict, while awaiting a slew of corporate earnings and data to gauge the state of the U.S. economy.
U.S. President Joe Biden will visit Israel on Wednesday, after Washington said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had agreed to allow humanitarian aid to reach Gazans.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Israel's «genocide» of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip should stop immediately, state TV reported, sparking concerns the conflict could escalate.
«Markets fear a ground offensive by Israel could ignite a larger and more complicated regional conflict that risks regional supply chains, energy output, economic growth and financial stability,» said Kyle Rodda, senior market analyst at Capital.com.
Long-dated U.S. Treasury yields rose on Tuesday, pushing megacap stocks Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) and Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) down between 0.4% — 0.7% in premarket trading.
Bank of America's profit rose in the third quarter as it joined rivals in earning more from interest payments by its customers, while investment banking and trading fared better than expected. Its shares were trading flat.
Pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) added 1.3% after raising its 2023 profit forecast.
Investors now await quarterly earnings from Goldman Sachs, due before market open, after some major U.S. banks on Friday said higher interest rates had boosted profits amid a slowing economy and cautious consumer behavior.
U.S. weapons maker Lockheed Martin (NYSE:LMT) will also report quarterly earnings before the opening
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