US STOCKS-Wall St headed higher on strong earnings start

Wall Street was set to open higher on Tuesday, as strong earnings reports from JPMorgan Chase, UnitedHealth, and Johnson & Johnson allayed concerns about the fallout from a prolonged U.S.-China trade war on corporate America. JPMorgan Chase & Co gained 2% in premarket trading after beating Wall Street estimates for third-quarter profit by a wide margin.

Shares of UnitedHealth Group Inc and Johnson & Johnson rose 2.2% and 1.7%, respectively. The healthcare companies reported strong quarterly results and raised their full-year profit forecasts. "A good earnings season with solid reporting and signs from companies saying the future is okay would assuage fears regarding an economic slowdown and recession," said Andre Bakhos, managing director at New Vines Capital LLC in Bernardsville, New Jersey.

Analysts are forecasting the worst quarterly profit performance in about three years for S&P 500 companies, with industrial companies among those most at risk from the trade dispute. Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs dropped 1% and 2%, respectively, after reporting a weaker-than-expected quarterly profit.

Collectively, banks are expected to report a 1.2% decline in earnings, their first year-on-year drop in three, due in part to low-interest rates and trade tensions. Wall Street has been rattled over the past 15 months by tit-for-tat tariffs by the United States and China, with the impact already reflecting in the domestic economy.

After a more than 11% increase in the first quarter, gains in the three main U.S. stock indexes tapered off in the second and third. The S&P 500 and Dow Jones kicked off the fourth quarter with a 0.4% drop so far in October. At 8:46 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were up 79 points, or 0.3%. S&P 500 e-minis were up 9 points, or 0.3% and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were up 20.75 points, or 0.26%.

Shares of BlackRock Inc, the world's biggest asset manager, rose slightly after its quarterly profit beat estimates. Home-furnishing retailer Bed Bath & Beyond Inc was up 3.8% after Keybanc upgraded the stock to "overweight".

Shares of mobile game developer Glu Mobile jumped 9.1% as it is set to replace SolarEdge Technologies in the S&P SmallCap 600. Lowe's Cos Inc rose 1.9% after Piper Jaffray upgraded the home improvement chain to "overweight" from "neutral".

Bank of America and Morgan Stanley are due to report later this week, along with Netflix Inc, Abbott Laboratories and Union Pacific. 

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)