10 things you need to know before the opening bell
The Bank of England cut rates. In a unanimous vote, the central bank lowered its benchmark interest rate 25 basis points to a record-low 0.25% as it looks to stabilize the British economy following the Brexit vote. The bank also announced it would expand its quantitative-easing program by 60 billion pounds and purchase corporate bonds. BOE head Mark Carney's press conference will begin at 7:30 a.m. ET.
The US is importing more oil than it's producing. A large OPEC supply has caused the US to import more oil than it has produced for the first time since January 2014. According to Vivek Dhar, a mining and energy commodities analyst at Commonwealth Bank, "the increase in US oil imports reflects OPEC's strategy to target market share instead of price." West Texas Intermediate crude oil is down 0.8% at $40.49.
Brazil's impeachment committee votes. A Brazilian Senate committee will vote Thursday whether to recommend that President Dilma Rousseff be removed from office. According to AFP, the vote isn't binding and is expected to overwhelmingly favor Rousseff's ousting.
Revenue from tech deals is at its highest level since the dot-com bubble. Tech mergers and acquisitions have brought in $1.9 billion this year, according to Dealogic. That's up 11.8% from the same period last year and trails only the same period in 2000 ($2.2 billion) for the highest total.
There's one market where electronic trading doesn't work so well. Craig Donohue, the executive chairman at The Options Clearing Corporation who was previously the CEO of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, says electronic trading doesn't work as well for options. "I've been away from it for a few years, but at least during my time I think we certainly saw that electronic trading in our more complicated options markets were, I think, significantly more difficult to achieve than in the futures markets, where you just had fewer instruments, concentrated liquidity in," Donohue told Business Insider.
Tesla missed on earnings. The electric-car maker lost an adjusted $1.06 a share on adjusted revenue of $1.56 billion. Tesla says it's on track for 50,000 deliveries in the second half of the year, which would put it at the low end of its 2016 guidance of 80,000 to 90,000 deliveries.
Toyota slashed its forecast. The world's largest automaker says full-year operating profit will come in at 1.6 trillion yen ($15.76 billion), down from its previous forecast of 1.7 trillion yen. That would represent a 44% drop in profit, caused mostly by the strength of the Japanese yen.
Stock markets around the world are up. Spain's IBEX (+1.3%) leads the gains in Europe after Japan's Nikkei (+1.1%) led the advance in Asia. S&P 500 futures are down 0.50 points at 2,156.50.
Earnings reporting remains heavy. Chesapeake Energy, Fannie Mae, Kellogg, and MGM Resorts are among the names reporting ahead of the opening bell, while Kraft Heinz, LinkedIn, and Priceline highlight the names releasing their quarterly results after markets close.
US economic data flows. Initial jobless claims will cross the wires at 8:30 a.m. ET, and factory orders are due out at 10 a.m. ET. Then, at 10:30 a.m. ET, natural-gas inventories will be released. The US 10-year yield is little changed at 1.54%.