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* Futures down: Dow 0.28%, S&P 0.30%, Nasdaq 0.16%
By Arjun Panchadar
Oct 31 (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures fell on Thursday
as uncertainty around a potential trade deal between the United
States and China overshadowed strong earnings reports from Apple
and Facebook.
Chinese officials have doubts about whether it is possible
to reach a comprehensive long-term trade deal with Washington
and U.S. President Donald Trump, Bloomberg reported earlier in
the day, citing unnamed sources. Hopes of a possible trade deal and interest rate cut by the
Federal Reserve have helped the benchmark S&P 500 hit record
high earlier this week.
The U.S. central bank lowered borrowing costs for the third
time this year on Wednesday to help sustain domestic growth
despite a slowdown in other parts of the world, but signalled
there would be no further reductions unless the economy takes a
turn for the worse. Another bright spot has been the third-quarter earnings
season, which has been largely better than expected so far.
Apple Inc AAPL.O rose 2.3% in premarket trading after the
iPhone maker forecast sales for the holiday shopping quarter
ahead of expectations. Facebook Inc FB.O jumped 4.6% after reporting an uptick in
users in lucrative markets and its third straight rise in
quarterly sales growth. On the economic calendar is the core PCE data, the Federal
Reserve's preferred measure of inflation, which is expected to
remained unchanged for the month. The report is due at 8:30 a.m.
At 6:55 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis 1YMcv1 were down 77 points,
or 0.28%. S&P 500 e-minis EScv1 were down 9 points, or 0.3%
and Nasdaq 100 e-minis NQcv1 were down 13 points, or 0.16%.
Among other stocks, Starbucks Corp SBUX.O climbed 2.8% as
the coffee chain topped quarterly same-store sales and revenue
estimates. Twitter Inc TWTR.N dropped 1.8% after the company said it
will ban political advertising on its platform next month.
Ride-hailing company Lyft Inc LYFT.O gained 6.3% as it
posted higher-than-expected quarterly revenue and an improved
outlook showed it was well on its way to profitability by the
end of 2021.