Wall Street futures gain as corporate earnings momentum builds

(Reuters) -Wall Street futures edged higher on Monday, as investors awaited earnings from corporate heavyweights and a delayed inflation report that could trigger fresh market moves later this week. Markets were still nursing bruises from last week's turbulence, as fears of systemic credit stress in the banking sector unnerved traders globally. However, upbeat earnings from some regional U.S. banks allayed concerns, offering a brief reprieve from the volatility. Earnings from Wall Street majors, including Tesla, Ford, GM, Netflix, Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, IBM and Intel, are also set to roll in this week, presenting a fresh stress test for the stock market. At 05:25 a.m. ET, Dow E-minis were up 124 points, or 0.27%, S&P 500 E-minis were up 23 points, or 0.35%, and Nasdaq 100 E-minis were up 109 points, or 0.77%. All the three indexes closed higher on Friday and logged weekly gains. The CBOE Volatility Index, Wall Street's fear gauge, also rose to its highest level in nearly six months on Friday, after renewed U.S.-China trade tensions fueled a flight to safety. U.S. President Donald Trump has floated the idea of lowering tariffs, if Beijing resumes key purchases such as soybeans. While Trump acknowledged that a proposed 100% tariff on Chinese goods would not be sustainable, he pinned the latest breakdown in talks on China's tightening grip over rare earth exports. Deutsche Bank analysts said Trump's dialed down rhetoric "added to investor expectations that those 100% tariffs won't come into force". DELAYED CPI The U.S. government shutdown has stalled key economic data releases since October 1, but attention now turns to the consumer price report, a closely watched inflation gauge that is due on Friday, just ahead of the Federal Reserve's policy meeting on October 28-29. September's core inflation is expected to hold steady at 3.1%. "There's still no sign of a compromise between Republicans and Democrats that would see the government re-open. In terms of the market implications, this is still affecting the flow of economic data, so we're not getting regular releases," Henry Allen, macro strategist at Deutsche Bank, said. Meanwhile, the Fed has not pushed back against rate-cut expectations, and futures are pricing in a quarter-point easing this month, with another reduction likely in December. Among early movers, cryptocurrency stocks rose in premarket trading after bitcoin gained for the third straight day. Bitfarms jumped 11.2%, while Strategy rose 3.4%. Riot Platforms advanced 3.7% and MARA Holdings was up 4.4%. (Reporting by Pranav Kashyap in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar)

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