Futures edge higher ahead of Goldman earnings, retail sales data By Reuters

By Devik Jain

(Reuters) – U.S. stock futures edged higher on Friday and pointed to weekly gains for major indexes, ahead of results from Goldman Sachs (NYSE:), which is expected to round out a strong third-quarter earnings season for big banks.

Shares of Wall Street’s most prolific dealmaker were up 0.7% in premarket trading.

Strong results from a clutch of banks, including Citigroup (NYSE:) and Morgan Stanley (NYSE:), propelled the to its biggest daily percentage gain since early March on Thursday, while data on the labor market and inflation eased fears over the outlook for higher rates.

However, a Commerce Department report, due at 08:30 a.m. ET, is likely to show retail sales fell in September amid continued shortages of motor vehicles and other goods.

The data will come against the backdrop of climbing oil prices, labor shortages and supply chain disruptions, factors that have rattled investors and have led to recent choppiness in the market.

At 06:33 a.m. ET, were up 147 points, or 0.42%, were up 15 points, or 0.34%, and were up 41.25 points, or 0.27%.

This week’s move into rate-sensitive growth names such as Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:), Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:), Apple Inc (NASDAQ:) and Google-parent Alphabet (NASDAQ:) looked set to continue, with their shares inching up.

Moderna (NASDAQ:) Inc rose 3.0% after a U.S. FDA panel voted to recommend booster shots of its COVID-19 vaccine for Americans aged 65 and older and high-risk people.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:) slipped 2.5% as Goldman Sachs downgraded the storage hardware maker’s stock to “neutral” from “buy”.

Shares of cryptocurrency and blockchain-related firms Coinbase (NASDAQ:) Global, China-based SOS, MicroStrategy Inc, Riot Blockchain (NASDAQ:), Marathon Digital added between 2.3% and 3.9% as bitcoin hit $60,000 for the first time since April.

Energy firms including Chevron Corp (NYSE:) and Exxon Mobil (NYSE:) gained about half a percent each, tracking prices that scaled $85 per barrel. [O/R]