U.S. stock futures pointed higher Thursday morning as traders looked to recover from a sharp sell-off the previous session, with the signing of a U.S.-Iran interim agreement pushing oil prices lower and offering some relief at the gas pump.
Among the major futures contracts, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was pointing to a gain of 303 points, or 0.6%, while S&P 500 futures added 0.9% and those tracking the Nasdaq $NDAQ 100 were up 1.6%.
AAA data showed the national average for a gallon of gasoline slipping under $4 for the first time since April, a development tied to crude prices pulling back toward where they stood before the war. Brent crude fell 1.4% to $78.44 a barrel.
Wednesday's sell-off came after the Federal Reserve held rates steady but signaled a more aggressive posture on future increases. The Fed's revised "dot plot" placed the median projected year-end rate at 3.8%, a step up from 3.4% in the March outlook and a signal that borrowing costs could rise at least once before year's end. New Fed Chair Kevin Warsh declined to enter a forecast of his own, leaving an additional layer of ambiguity over where policy is headed.
CME $CME Group futures pricing put the odds of a September rate increase at 64%, a sharp jump from the roughly 29% probability that prevailed heading into Wednesday's Fed decision.
Semiconductor shares posted some of the sharpest premarket moves, led by Intel $INTC, which surged 9% after President Donald Trump announced a domestic chip-design partnership between the company and Apple $AAPL. Micron $MU climbed 4.7% and Nvidia $NVDA was up 1.2%.
Record highs were logged in Asia, where Tokyo's Nikkei 225 advanced 1.7% and Seoul's Kospi rose 2.3%. On the monetary policy front, the Bank of England opted to keep its benchmark rate unchanged as well, with major central banks broadly wary of the war's continued inflationary pressure.