US pre-open: Futures mixed ahead of final session of earnings heavy week

Wall Street futures were pointing to a mixed start to trading ahead of the bell on Friday as a busy week for corporate earnings gets set to draw to a close.

As of 1225 BST, Dow Jones futures were up 0.10%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures had the indices opening 0.28% and 0.52% lower, respectively.

The Dow closed 162.06 points higher on Thursday as market participants continued to thumb over earnings from some of the nation's biggest companies.

Corporate earnings looked set to continue to be the session's primary focus on Friday, with shares in Snapchat parent company Snap losing more than a quarter of their value in extending trading after the group posted second-quarter results overnight that failed to meet expectations on the Street and said it now plans to slow hiring.

In terms of Friday's earnings, American Express, Verizon, and Twitter were all slated to report throughout the course of the day.

AvaTrade's Naeem Aslam said: "Looking at the US futures, especially the Nasdaq, tech investors are still disappointed with Snap's results which sent the social media stock plunging yesterday. The shares tanked over 26% in the aftermarket and are likely to see more punishments today.

"Today, traders are likely to maintain a somewhat cautious approach as today is the last trading day of the week and next week, we have the FOMC decision coming out. Given the fact that inflation readings are running red hot, we are likely to see the Fed showing more of its aggressive side. "

Also drawing an amount of investor attention was news that Ukraine and Russia had agreed to sign a deal to restart their grain exports after the cessation thereof caused a threat to soft commodities' supply.

On the macro front, a flash reading of July's S&P composite PMI will be published at 1445 BST.

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com