U.S. stock futures point slightly higherItaly sells another...

U.S. stock futures point slightly higher
Italy sells another round of bonds; investors await jobless claims

By William L. Watts, MarketWatch

FRANKFURT (MarketWatch) — U.S. stock-index futures held small gains on Thursday, with Italy’s borrowing costs decreasing as it sold another round of government bonds in a test of market confidence, and as investors awaited the latest round of weekly U.S. jobless-claims data.

Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJ2H +0.16% rose 22 points to 12,103.

S&P 500 Index futures SP2H +0.14% were up 1.9 points at 1,246.40, while Nasdaq 100 futures ND2H +0.10% added 3 points to 2,262.50.

News reports said Italy sold around 7.02 billion euros ($9 billion) of government bonds, with yields declining from a month ago for 3- and 10-year bonds. The sale follows Wednesday’s well-received auction of six-month Treasury bills that also saw borrowing costs decline.

In addition to the 2014 and 2022 bonds, Italy also sold an off-the-run 2021 bond and an indexed 2018 bond. Italy had planned to sell as much as €8.5 billion of bonds in the auction.
Economic reports

The Labor Department will release its latest jobless-claims data at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch forecast first-time claims in the week ended Dec. 24 totaled 374,000, up from 364,000 the previous week.

The purchasing-managers index for the Chicago region is set for release at 9:45 a.m., while November pending home sales figures are set for release at 10 a.m. Eastern, followed by the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank survey results for December at 11 a.m.

European equities pared gains after the Italian auction but remained higher on the day. Read Europe Markets.

Asian shares ended mostly lower, as lingering worries about Europe’s debt crisis kept investors on the sidelines, analysts said. Read Asia Markets.

Wall Street on Wednesday fell sharply in moves exacerbated by thin trading conditions, analysts said. The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA -1.14% dropped 139.94 points, or 1.1%, to close at 12,151.41. The Dow remains up 5% on the year.

The S&P 500 Index SPX -1.25% lost 15.79 points, or 1.3%, to close at 1,249.64, pushing it back into negative territory for the year to date.

The Nasdaq Composite Index COMP -1.34% dropped 35.22 points, or 1.3%, to end at 2,589.98, leaving it down 2.4% for the year.

Nymex crude-oil futures rose 7 cents in electronic trade to $99.43 a barrel.

The dollar index DXY +0.38% , which tracks the U.S. unit against a basket of major rivals, roe 0.2% to 80.699.