Stocks: All about bank earnings, economic reports

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NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Before U.S. stocks begin trading Thursday, investors have a lot to chew on.

Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500) reported fourth-quarter earnings in line with expectations. Morgan Stanley (MS, Fortune 500) posted a loss, but it wasn't as deep as analysts had expected.

Meanwhile, the government released an onslaught of economic data, including reports on housing, unemployment claims and inflation.

Initial jobless claims fell to their lowest level in nearly four years, in another sign of improvement in the long-suffering labor market.

S&P 500 (SPX), Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) and Nasdaq (COMP) futures made modest gains ahead of the opening bell. Stock futures indicate the possible direction of the markets when they open at 9:30 a.m. ET.

Stan Bokov, chief operations officer of TradingView, expects it to be a volatile, but overall positive day.

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"Despite earnings trailing projections and all of this uncertainty about Europe, there seems to be confidence in the U.S. economy overall," he said.

U.S. stocks advanced to six-month highs Wednesday, as investors welcomed the International Monetary Fund plan to boost its bailout fund and contain Europe's debt crisis.

Investors remain focused on Europe's crisis this week, with the IMF exploring options to raise up to $500 billion in additional lending resources.

Early Thursday, Spanish and French bond auctions drew solid demand, calming some fears about Europe's ability to fund its debt.

Greek officials will continue talks with the group representing private-sector investors and banks Thursday in an attempt to reach an agreement on the size of the writedown these creditors will take. No accord has yet been announced, but the creditors' representative says one may come in the days ahead.

World markets: European stocks were higher in midday trading. Britain's FTSE 100 (UKX) ticked up 0.5%, the DAX (DAX) in Germany rose 0.7% and France's CAC 40 (CAC40) added 1.4%.

Asian markets ended notably higher. The Shanghai Composite (SHCOMP) and the Hang Seng (HSI) in Hong Kong both climbed 1.3%, while Japan's Nikkei (N225) gained 1%.

Economy: The government released December data on inflation, building permits and housing starts, as well as its latest tally of weekly jobless claims.

The Labor Department reported that 352,000 people filed for initial unemployment benefits last week, down sharply from a revised reading of 402,000 claims in the previous week. It is also the fewest number of people filing for jobless claims since the week ending April 19, 2008.

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Consumer prices held steady last month, largely due to declining gas prices. The government's key measure of inflation, the Consumer Price Index, showed prices were virtually unchanged from November to December.

The index for items minute food and energy rose 0.1% in December, after rising 0.2% in November.

Housing starts fell 4.1% in December, to an annual rate of 657,000 units. Building permits slipped 0.1% to an annual rate of 679,000.

Companies: Results from Bank of America and Morgan Stanley cap a week of fourth-quarter reports from the leaders of Wall Street.

Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500) rose in premarket trading, a day after reporting earnings that beat estimates and revenue that missed. Citigroup (C, Fortune 500) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) both filed disappointing results in the past week, while Wells Fargo (WFC, Fortune 500) beat expectations on earnings.

Eastman Kodak (EK, Fortune 500) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Thursday. Once a component of the Dow Jones industrial average, the company was recently trading around 39 cents a share.

UnitedHealth Group (UNH, Fortune 500) reported fourth-quarter earnings that beat forecasts.

Some of the nation's biggest tech firms will report their corporate results after the closing bell Thursday -- including Google (GOOG, Fortune 500), IBM (IBM, Fortune 500), Intel (INTC, Fortune 500) and Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500).

Google is expected to post robust earnings of $10.49 a share, up from $8.75 a year earlier. Microsoft's earnings are expected to remain essentially flat compared to the prior year, at 76 cents a share. IBM's earnings per share are projected to climb from $4.18 a year earlier to $4.62.

Currencies and commodities: The dollar fell against the euro and British pound, but edged higher against the Japanese yen.

Oil for February delivery added 91 cents to $101.50 a barrel.

Gold futures for February delivery ticked up 50 cents $1,660.40 an ounce, losing momentum from earlier gains.

Bonds: The price on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury rose, pushing the yield down to 1.89% from 1.90% late Wednesday.