Stocks set for pre-holiday rally

Futures point to positive start after past session's big gains; improved sentiment lifts global markets.

July 3 2007: 4:45 AM EDT

LONDON (CNNMoney.com) -- Stocks looked set to build on the past session's gains Tuesday, although trading is likely to be light a day before the July 4 holiday.

At 4:30 a.m. ET, futures were higher, with a comparison to fair value pointing to an advance for Wall Street at the open.

Wall Street kicked off the second half with solid gains Monday, lifted by a solid report on manufacturing, deal news and a decline in Treasury yields.

Investors will have a shortened trading day on Tuesday, with stock markets closing at 1 p.m. ET and bond markets closing at 2 p.m. ET ahead of July 4. U.S. financial markets will be closed Wednesday.

The rally on Wall Street helped lift sentiment overseas, where markets in Asia finished higher and European shares rose at the open.

In major corporate news, Wall Street firm Bear Stearns (Charts, Fortune 500) plans to increase oversight of its money management unit following the blowup of two of its hedge funds, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

German software company SAP (Charts) admitted one of its units downloaded documents from rival Oracle (Charts, Fortune 500) but said it did not have access to that intellectual property.  Top of page

A look at more news and numbers ahead of the U.S. open
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Market indexes are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer LIBOR Warning: Neither BBA Enterprises Limited, nor the BBA LIBOR Contributor Banks, nor Reuters, can be held liable for any irregularity or inaccuracy of BBA LIBOR. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2012 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer The Dow Jones IndexesSM are proprietary to and distributed by Dow Jones & Company, Inc. and have been licensed for use. All content of the Dow Jones IndexesSM © 2012 is proprietary to Dow Jones & Company, Inc. Chicago Mercantile Association. The market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2012. All rights reserved. Most stock quote data provided by BATS.
© 2012 Cable News Network. A Time Warner Company. All Rights Reserved. Terms under which this service is provided to you. Privacy Policy. Ad choices .