Investing.com - U.S. futures were higher, as Wednesday's brief panic over global growth receded and investors took comfort from better-than-expected earnings, including a report from ride-sharing company Lyft (NASDAQ:LYFT).
LYFT (NASDAQ:LYFT) surged 6% in premarket trading, after it reported a 72% jump in revenue and a narrower loss than expected after the close on Wednesday. It said earnings were fueled by more active riders. The company also said it expects its ride-hailing service to be profitable in the future but did not give a timeline.
Rival Uber Technologies (NYSE:UBER) jumped 4.7% and is expected to report its earnings after the close, with analysts forecasting a loss of $2.10 on revenue of $3.31 billion.
Both stocks are still trading over 10% below where their IPOs priced earlier this year.
Nasdaq 100 futures rose 35 points or 0.5% by 6:40 AM ET (10:40 GMT), while Dow futures rallied 44 points or 0.2% and S&P 500 futures gained 7 points or 0.3%.
Trade-related worries died down slightly after better-than-expected Chinese data calmed investors, defying the increasing pressure from U.S. tariffs. China’s exports rose 3.3% in July, while imports fell 5.6% on the year, less than expected. The data helped ease concerns over a currency war after China let its yuan slide to its lowest in over a decade.
Elsewhere, Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) rose 0.8% after news that it won a bidding war to score a deal with Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and Dan Weiss. Walt Disney (NYSE:DIS) was up 1.1%, while Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) gained 0.4%.
On the earnings front, Kraft Heinz (NASDAQ:KHC) and Viacom (NASDAQ:VIA) report before the open, while Dropbox (NASDAQ:DBX), and News Corp (NASDAQ:NWSA) give their results after the market close.
Jobless claims come out at 8:30 AM ET (12:30 GMT) and wholesale trade numbers due at 10:00 AM ET (14:00 GMT).
In commodities, crude oil surged 2.1% to $52.17 a barrel, after falling nearly 5% in the prior session. Gold futures slipped from a six-year peak, dipping 0.7% to $1,508.65 a troy ounce, while the U.S. dollar index, which measures the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, was flat at 97.365.