U.S. stock futures rose Thursday morning, building on Wednesday's somewhat indecisive close that saw major indices barely budge. Futures across all major benchmark indices were pointing higher as traders digested the Federal Reserve's latest move and a torrent of tech earnings.

The Federal Reserve kept the federal funds rate unchanged at 3.5%-3.75% on Wednesday, effectively putting its easing cycle on ice after three rate cuts last year that brought borrowing costs down to their lowest levels since 2022. It's the monetary policy equivalent of "let's just see what happens next."

During the press conference that followed, Fed Chair Jerome Powell deftly sidestepped questions about political criticism and ongoing legal scrutiny of the central bank, choosing instead to stick to his well-worn script about data dependency. "We will continue to make our decisions meeting by meeting… letting the data light the way for us," he said, which is Fed-speak for "we're genuinely not sure what's coming next, so we're going to keep our options open."

The 10-year Treasury bond was yielding 4.26%, while the two-year bond sat at 3.58%. According to the CME Group's FedWatch tool, markets are pricing in an 86.5% likelihood that the Federal Reserve will leave interest rates exactly where they are when policymakers meet again in March. That's about as close to a sure thing as you get in markets that are supposedly efficient.

Here's how the major indices performed on Wednesday:

The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) and Invesco QQQ Trust ETF (QQQ), which track the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 indices respectively, were both trading higher in Thursday's premarket session. SPY was up 0.30% at $697.50, while QQQ advanced 0.36% to $635.50.

The Tech Earnings Rollercoaster

Microsoft's Paradox

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) fell 5.77% in premarket trading Thursday despite reporting second-quarter financial results that actually beat expectations. This is one of those situations where good news somehow becomes bad news, which happens surprisingly often when a stock is priced for perfection.

The issue? Microsoft's remaining performance obligations, basically the value of contracts with customers that haven't been paid yet, hit $625 billion. That sounds enormous, and it is, but apparently not enormous enough for what investors were hoping to see. When you're Microsoft and your AI narrative is worth hundreds of billions in market cap, every metric gets scrutinized like it's the Zapruder film.

According to market data, MSFT maintains a weak price trend across the medium, short, and long terms, though it scores well on quality rankings. Translation: it's a great company whose stock hasn't been doing great lately.

Tesla's AI Twist

Tesla Inc. (TSLA) advanced 2.71% after posting better-than-expected results for the fourth quarter. But here's where it gets interesting: the company also announced plans to invest approximately $2 billion into CEO Elon Musk's artificial intelligence startup, xAI.

This raises all sorts of fascinating questions about corporate governance, conflicts of interest, and whether Tesla is an auto company, a robotics company, an energy company, or just a vehicle for funding whatever Musk finds interesting at the moment. But apparently investors are fine with it for now.

Market data shows TSLA maintains a stronger price trend over the long and medium terms but shows weakness in the short term, with a poor value ranking. Make of that what you will.

Apple Awaits Its Turn

Apple Inc. (AAPL) was trading 0.48% higher ahead of its quarterly earnings report scheduled for after the closing bell. Analysts are expecting earnings of $2.67 per share on revenue of $138.42 billion, which would be impressive if those numbers weren't so large they've lost all meaning to normal human comprehension.

Apple maintains a stronger price trend over the long term but shows weakness in the short and medium terms, though it gets solid marks for quality. Everyone still loves the iPhone maker, they're just not sure what happens next with AI and China and everything else.

Meta's Blowout Quarter

Meta Platforms Inc. (META) jumped 7.67% after reporting fourth-quarter revenue of $59.89 billion, beating analyst estimates of $58.30 billion. Its fourth-quarter adjusted earnings came in at $8.88 per share, crushing estimates of $8.16 per share.

This is what happens when you actually beat expectations by a meaningful margin rather than just barely clearing a bar that analysts have carefully positioned at "achievable but impressive-sounding." Market data indicates that META maintains a strong price trend over the short, medium, and long terms with a good quality ranking, which is another way of saying the stock is working and the company is executing.

IBM's Comeback Story Continues

International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) shares climbed 7.98% after reporting fourth-quarter revenue of $19.69 billion, beating the consensus estimate of $19.23 billion, and adjusted earnings of $4.52 per share, beating analyst estimates of $4.32 per share.

Remember when IBM was considered a dinosaur? Apparently that dinosaur is having a pretty good year. IBM maintains a stronger price trend over the short, medium, and long term with a solid quality ranking, suggesting that whatever the company is doing to reinvent itself is actually working.

What Happened Wednesday

Wednesday's session saw energy and information technology stocks buck the overall market trend and close higher, while real estate, consumer staples, and health care recorded the biggest losses. It was one of those days where the market as a whole went nowhere, but the internals told a more interesting story.

What the Smart Money Is Thinking

BlackRock maintains a constructive outlook on the economy, driven by the belief that "immutable economic laws" are currently limiting extreme policy shifts. This is a fancy way of saying that reality has a way of constraining what politicians and policymakers can actually do, no matter what they threaten on social media.

While recent volatility followed geopolitical tensions and tariff threats, the firm notes that the U.S. economy's "dependence on foreign financing" to fund its debt acts as a natural stabilizer. Put differently: when you owe the world trillions of dollars, you can't afford to do anything too crazy or the people lending you money might get nervous.

BlackRock expects the Federal Reserve to adopt a "wait-and-see" stance, likely leaving interest rates unchanged this week due to mixed signals in recent jobs and inflation data. This turned out to be exactly right.

Regarding the stock market, BlackRock remains overweight U.S. equities, viewing the "AI buildout" as a major structural driver supported by strong earnings. This is the bull case in a nutshell: AI is real, it's expensive, and American companies are the ones building it.

However, they highlight a "leveraging up" theme, forecasting record U.S. investment-grade bond issuance of $1.85 trillion this year. While they believe mega-cap tech firms are issuing debt from a "position of strength," they caution that increased leverage makes the financial system "more vulnerable to shocks" such as bond yield spikes.

This is worth paying attention to. When everyone is borrowing money because it seems like a smart idea, that's usually when something breaks. BlackRock prefers high-yield bonds over investment-grade bonds and remains underweight long-term government bonds, which tells you something about where they think the risks really are.

Economic Data on the Horizon

Here's what investors will be keeping an eye on Thursday:

• Initial jobless claims data for the week ending Jan. 24, the delayed report of November's U.S. trade deficit, and the revised third quarter data for U.S. productivity will be released by 8:30 a.m. ET.
• November's delayed report for wholesale inventories and factory orders will be out by 10:00 a.m. ET.

Some of these reports are delayed because of various government shutdowns and holidays, which makes reading the economic tea leaves even harder than usual.

Commodities, Crypto, and Global Markets

Crude oil futures were trading higher in the early New York session, up 2.55% to hover around $64.82 per barrel. Energy traders are trying to figure out what actually happens with tariffs, geopolitical tensions, and supply dynamics, which is basically impossible but they have to price something.

Gold Spot US Dollar rose 1.88% to hover around $5,519.32 per ounce. Its last record high stood at $5,595.44 per ounce, which means gold is having one of those moments where it reminds everyone why people have been using it as a store of value for several thousand years. The U.S. Dollar Index spot was 0.19% higher at the 96.2600 level.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin (BTC) was trading 1.57% lower at $87,847.25 per coin. After its recent run-up, crypto is taking a breather while everyone watches to see what happens with traditional markets.

Asian markets closed higher on Thursday, except Australia's ASX 200 index. Hong Kong's Hang Seng, China's CSI 300, South Korea's Kospi, Japan's Nikkei 225, and India's Nifty 50 indices all rose. European markets were mixed in early trading, because European markets are always mixed in early trading.

The overall picture is one of cautious optimism mixed with genuine uncertainty, which is probably the most honest way to describe markets at any given moment. The Fed is on pause, earnings are mixed but generally strong, and everyone is trying to figure out what comes next. Same as it ever was.