A Peek Into The Market Before The Trading Starts

Pre-open movers US stock futures are higher this morning, ahead of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's testimony before the Senate Banking Committee. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average surged 24 points to 13,812.00 and S&P 500 index futures rose 2.50 points to 1,489.70. Nasdaq 100 futures gained 4.25 points to 2,706.50. A Peek Into Global Markets European markets were lower today. The STOXX Europe 600 Index fell 1.19%, London's FTSE 100 Index dropped 1.37%, French CAC 40 Index fell 2.49% and German DAX 30 index declined 1.87%. Asian markets ended lower, with Japan's Nikkei Stock Average declining 2.26%, China's Shanghai Composite falling 1.40% and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 dropping 1%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index declined 1.32% and India's Sensex fell 1.64%. Broker Recommendation Analysts at RBC Capital upgraded SanDisk SNDK from “sector perform” to “outperform.” The target price for SanDisk has been raised from $50 to $65. SanDisk shares surged 0.93% to $49.77 in pre-market trading. Breaking news

• Home Depot HD reported a 32% rise in its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings. To read the full news, click here.
• MasterCard MA and VimpelCom VIP today announced a strategic partnership combining MasterCard's best in class mobile payments technology and solutions with VimpelCom's globally integrated telecommunications services. To read the full news, click here.
• TeleCommunication Systems TSYS today introduced its Cloud Messaging Service, which delivers short message service (SMS) messages over 2G, 3G and LTE networks. TCS' Cloud Messaging Service offers an end-to-end network interoperability with all core components. To read the full news, click here.
• Indonesian financial institution PT Bank Permata Tbk (PermataBank), BlackBerry(R) BBRY and Mobile Money leader Monitise plc announced the commercial pilot launch of BBM Money. To read the full news, click here.