Stock Futures Jump as Earnings Season Heats Up

Wall Street is looking to extend yesterday's bounce as investors unpack a deluge of earnings reports. Futures tied the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), S&P 500 Index (SPX), and Nasdaq-100 Index (NDX) are all above fair-market value. Elsewhere, Treasury yields are steady, hovering just beneath their year-to-date highs as traders await clues regarding the Federal Reserve's future monetary policy moves. 

Continue reading for more on today's market, including: 

• Schaeffer's Senior V.P. of Research digs into the implications of delta-hedge selling.
• Aluminum stock boosted by analyst upgrade.
• Plus, 2 quarterly reports to parse, and a pre-earnings look at Ford Motor stock. 

5 Things You Need to Know Today

1. The Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE) saw nearly 1.6 million call contracts and 899,390 put contracts exchanged Monday. The single-session equity put/call ratio fell to 0.57, while the 21-day moving average stayed at 0.71.
2. Spotify Technology SA (NYSE:SPOT) stock is 11.9% higher before the bell, after the music streaming giant crushed first-quarter earnings and revenue estimates. SPOT is on track to tack onto a 103.5% year-over-year lead.
3. The shares of PulteGroup, Inc. (NYSE:PHM) are 3.5% higher before the bell, following the homebuilder's better-than-expected earnings and revenue results for the first quarter. Coming into today, PHM is up 71.6% over the past 12 months.
4. Ford Motor Co (NYSE:F) is up 2.2% ahead of the open and trying to add to a 7.2% year-to-date lead ahead of earnings. The car manufacturer is slated to take to the earnings confessional after the market closes tomorrow. Wall Street expects the company to post earnings of 42 cents per share on revenue of $40.1 billion. 
5. Manufacturing and services data is due out today, with the personal consumption expenditures price (PCE) index coming later this week.

Japan, Euro Zone Business Activity Picks Up

Asian markets were a mixed bag today. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng led the region with a 1.9% pop, shrugging off a disappointing debut from bubble tea chain Chabaidao. Japan’s Nikkei tacked on 0.3%, after business activity rose at its fastest pace in eight months. Among the laggards, South Korea’s Kospi shed 0.2% while China’s Shanghai Composite fell 0.7% for a third-straight loss.

Over in Europe, bourses are heading higher, as euro zone business activity expanded in April. London’s FTSE 100 was last seen up 0.06%, earlier hitting a record high and now heading for a fourth-straight win, with U.K. stocks boosted by sterling falling against the U.S. dollar. The French CAC 40 and German DAX are up 0.4% and 0.9%, respectively, at last check.