Stock futures edged higher Friday morning, steadying after a broad selloff that sent major U.S. indexes to their worst session in more than a month.
S&P 500 futures added 0.2% Friday morning after the index posted its worst single-day drop since late June
Michael M. Santiago / Getty Images
Stock futures edged higher Friday morning, steadying after a broad selloff that sent major U.S. indexes to their worst session in more than a month.
S&P 500 futures were 0.2% to the good, Nasdaq $NDAQ-100 futures ticked up 0.1%, and Dow Jones Industrial Average futures advanced 204 points, equivalent to about 0.4%. That bounce followed a rough Thursday in which the Dow shed more than 500 points, marking its fifth losing day out of the last six, and both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq notched declines of 1.2% and 2.2% — their sharpest in more than a month.
Intel $INTC stock was up roughly 4% before the opening bell after the chipmaker's second-quarter earnings beat what analysts had anticipated, according to CNBC.
Oil's retreat from a recent spike also helped steady sentiment. Brent crude, having crossed $100 a barrel this week for the first time since late May, retreated to the $97–$98 range, shedding about 3%. WTI, the U.S. crude benchmark, was off roughly 2%, holding just above $89 a barrel. According to The Wall Street Journal, the drop in crude helped ease pressure on government bond yields, which had climbed Thursday on concerns that rising energy costs could reignite inflation.
Thursday's session had been hit from multiple directions. Tesla $TSLA shares cratered close to 15%, a magnitude of daily loss not seen since March 10, 2025, after the company's second-quarter results fell short of expectations. Alphabet $GOOGL shed 7% on the day — a drop unseen since May 7, 2025 — after it unveiled a higher full-year spending plan for capital investment.
The surge in oil prices has been tied to escalating tensions in the Middle East. President Donald Trump told Axios on Thursday that he is considering a "massive attack" on Iran — larger than anything carried out so far — saying the country had not "received enough pain yet." U.S. forces have completed 13 consecutive nights of strikes on Iranian targets, according to CNBC.
European equity markets got off to a positive start Friday, with the pan-European Stoxx 600 up 0.5%, Germany's DAX ahead by 0.8%, France's CAC 40 higher by 0.4%, and London's FTSE 100 adding 0.3%. Across Asia, indexes finished lower, with South Korea's Kospi among the hardest hit at minus 5.7% and Japan's Nikkei 225 finishing down 2.7%.
On a weekly basis, the Dow was nursing a loss of around 0.8% and the S&P 500 about 0.7%, with the Nasdaq trailing both at roughly minus 1.5%. Brent crude futures are up about 12% on the week, according to The Wall Street Journal.
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