The Dow Jones and the S&P 500 were expected to go their separate ways ahead of the release of the gross domestic product (GDP) data.
The Dow, which broke its losing streak on Thursday to close at 24,322, up 239 points, was expected by spread bettors to open at around 24,281, down 41 points.
In contrast, the S&P, which advanced 28 points yesterday to close at 2,667, was expected to add around five points to yesterday's gains.
The first quarter GDP numbers will be out at 8.30 (ET), and according to Connor Campbell at Spreadex, “analysts are expecting a rather sharp decline between the fourth and first quarters, with forecasts pointing to a drop from 2.9% to 2.0% (at the annualised rate)”.
Ken Odeluga, at rival spread betting firm City Index, warns that “if the headline figure is better than feared, stock markets should brace for further turbulence.”
Ahead of the release of the GDP data, the yield on the 10-year Treasury note was down slightly at 2.975%.
The dollar was flexing its muscles on the forex markets, with the dollar index rising 0.14 to 85.59, helped by the weakness of sterling after some dismal UK GDP figures.
Despite the disappointing economic growth, the UK's FTSE 100 was up 61 at 7,482; elsewhere in Europe, Germany's DAX was up 97 at 12,597 while France's CAC 40 was 14 points firmer at 5,468.
Overnight in Asia, markets rose pretty much across the board. In Japan, the Nikkei 225 surged 148 points to 22,468 while in Hong Kong the Hang Seng was 273 points higher at 30,281.
Turning to UK corporate news, online retail behemoth Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) delighted the market with its first-quarter numbers.
Net income of US$1.6bn was equivalent to earnings per share of US$3.27, up from US$1.48 a year earlier and well ahead of the US$1.24 analysts had been expecting.
Somehow, on pre-tax profit of US$1.92bn the company contrived to pay only US$287mln in taxes.
Revenue rose to US$51bn from US$35.7bn in the corresponding period of 2017, ahead of the US$49.9bn the market had been expecting.
The shares were up 7.7% at US$1,634.50 in pre-market trading.
A technology giant from what now seems a different age – Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) – was also getting some love in electronic trading, rising 3.5% to US$97.52 on the back of better-than-expected fiscal third quarter results.
Earnings per share in the first three months of 2018 rose 36% year-on-year to US$0.95 on revenue that rose 16% to US$26.8bn. Analysts had been expecting earnings per share of 85 cents.
Chip-maker Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC), which for many years played the Scylla to Intel's Charybdis, surged 7.1% higher to US$56.80 in pre-market trading after it raised full-year guidance.
First quarter figures were better than the market had been anticipating, thanks largely to strong growth in “Chipzilla's” data centers business.