A Peek Into The Markets: U.S. Stock Futures Gain; Yellen Speech In Focus

Pre-open movers

U.S. stock futures traded higher in early pre-market trade. The Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen is scheduled to testify before the Senate Banking Committee in Washington at 10:00 a.m. ET, while the Federal Reserve Gov. Jerome Powell is scheduled to speak in New York at 2:30 p.m. ET. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 69 points to 17,780.00, while the Standard & Poor’s 500 index futures rose 10 points to 2,084.25. Futures for the Nasdaq 100 index surged 22.25 points to 4,412.25.

Oil prices traded lower as Brent crude futures dropped 1.20 percent to trade at $50.04 per barrel, while US WTI crude futures also declined 1.13 percent to trade at $48.81 a barrel. The API's crude oil inventory report for the recent week will be released at 4:35 p.m. ET.

A Peek Into Global Markets

European markets were mostly higher today, with the Spanish Ibex Index rising 0.35 percent, STOXX Europe 600 Index surging 0.52 percent and German DAX 30 index gaining 0.48 percent. The UK's FTSE index was trading lower by 0.03 percent, while French CAC 40 Index rose 0.63 percent. Germany's ZEW measure of economic expectations increased to 19.2 in June, compared to 6.4 points in May.

In Asian markets, Japan’s Nikkei Stock Average rose 1.28 percent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index gained 0.77 percent, China’s Shanghai Composite Index declined 0.35 percent and India’s BSE Sensex fell 0.20 percent. Hong Kong's composite CPI increased 2.6 percent year-over-year in May.

Broker Recommendation

Analysts at KeyBanc upgraded Helmerich & Payne, Inc. HP from Sector Weight to Overweight.

Helmerich & Payne shares fell 0.89 percent to close at $65.63 on Monday.

Breaking news

• Facebook Inc FB held its annual shareholder meeting Monday and made moves to keep the company's leadership in tact. Facebook shareholders approved a proposal that allows Mark Zuckerberg to remain in charge of Facebook as he intends to donate a majority of his shares to charity. To read the full news, click here.



• OSI Systems, Inc. OSIS reported a deal to buy American Science & Engineering, Inc. ASEI for $37 per share in cash.



• Lennar Corporation LEN reported stronger-than-expected results for its second quarter on Tuesday.



• IsoRay Inc. ISR, today announced David G. Brachman, MD, FACRO, Director of Radiation Oncology, Barrow Neurological Institute, and Clinical Professor of Radiation Oncology, University of Arizona College of Medicine-Phoenix, presented the findings of a prospective trial entitled: "Prospective trial of surgery and permanent intraoperative brachytherapy (S+BT) using a modular, biocompatible radiation implant for recurrent aggressive meningiomas," at the Society of Neuro-Oncology Conference on Meningioma, Toronto, Canada. To read the full news, click here.