US open: Stocks rise on stronger oil prices, dollar while Twitter tumbles

US stocks rose on Thursday following stronger oil prices and dollar, while Twitter tumbled following disappointing quarterly results.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.39% to 20,132.93, the S&P 500 gained 0.41% to 2,304.14 and the Nasdaq was 0.43% higher to 5,706.77 at 1533 GMT

Meanwhile, oil prices advanced following heavy losses in the previous session, with West Texas Intermediate up 1.37% to $53.07 per barrel and Brent crude 1.02% firmer to $55.69 a barrel.

In currency markets, the dollar gained ahead of President’ Trump’s meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday, which lowered the yen.

The greenback was 1.08% stronger against the yen to 113.14, was up 0.05% against the pound to 0.7978 and rose 0.27% versus the euro to 0.9372.

Twitter tumbled 11.67% missing analysts' expectations for fourth quarter revenue, although it did beat on earnings per share, while its user growth was flat once again in the face of competition from other social networks such as Snapchat, Facebook and its Instagram arm.

Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets, said: “It does appear that the Trump effect has helped Twitter to boost its user base, with a 4% rise in monthly active users, with daily active users also rising due to the Presidential debates.

“While headline earnings came in ahead of expectations at $0.16c a share revenues fell short, coming in at $717m, but it was their guidance that has seen the shares drop sharply, as they cut it to between $75m to $95m, a horrendous mark down and well down from the $190m most had been expecting.”

In other corporate news, Dun & Bradstreet skidded 16.09% after its fourth quarter earnings missed forecasts but revenues beat expectations.

Coca-Cola was down 2.5% after reporting that revenue was boosted by North American demand but predicted a fall in 2017 profit.

Whole Foods Market was up 2.03% after its shares declined late on Wednesday as it posted a drop in same-store sales.

Electric car maker Tesla rose 2.42% following a report it will produce test versions of its Model 3 vehicle.

Dunkin’ Brands gained 4.58% after swinging to a profit and beat earnings expectations.

Kellogg’s was up 3.65% as profit rose above expectations, but also cut its sales forecast for 2017.

Viacom added 4.85% after posting a better-than-expected quarterly profit.

After the closing bell, Expedia, News Corp, Pandora Media, Activision Blizzard and Nvidia are slated to report.

On the data front, the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell last week to a near-three month low. US initial jobless claims declined 12,000 from the previous week's unrevised level to 234,000. Economists had been expecting a jump to 250,000.

Meanwhile, the four-week moving average came in at 244,250, down 3,750 from the previous week’s unrevised average of 248,000. This marked the lowest level for this average since 3 November 1973 when it was 244,000.

US wholesale inventories remained flat as expected at 1% in December, while wholesale trade sales rose 2.6% from 0.5% in November, which was the biggest rise since March 2011.

Investors are also eyeing a speech by Chicago Fed President Charles Evans at 1810 GMT.