U.S. stocks set to open higher after Apple-inspired selloff; U.S. data on tap

Thursday is expected to mark a rise in the U.S. stock index futures after two days of losses as investors awaited a fresh series of earnings results and weekly jobless numbers in the U.S..

Futures for the Nasdaq 100 index jumped 9 points, or 0.2%, to 4,626, indicating the index will be on track to break a two-day losing run.

On Thursday, both S&P 500 index and Dow Jones Industrial Average looked set to open higher, with futures for the Dow average up 12 points, or 0.1%, to 17,797, while those for the S&P 500 added 1.85 points, or 0.1%, to 2,109.75.

Corporate earnings will continue to drive the market with a host of big companies scheduled to report on Thursday. McDonald's, Caterpillar and 3M are scheduled to report before the bell while Visa, Amazon and AT&T will report after the close.

A day earlier, Wall Street declined as the technology sector fell on disappointing results from giants including Microsoft and Apple which recovered partly from Wednesday’s drop and rose 0.5%. The iPhone maker late Wednesday cut its annual spending forecast by $1 billion.

The wider selloff in tech shares also hit sentiment in the S&P 500 index and Dow Jones Industrial Average, which both ended lower for a second straight day.

Later in the day, investors will await weekly jobless data, which is due at 8:30 a.m. ET (1230 GMT). The number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits is expected to have slightly declined by 1,000 to 280,000 as the U.S. labor market continues to firm.

At the same time, the Chicago Fed national activity index for June is due, followed by a report on leading indicators in June at 10 a.m. Eastern.

In Europe, markets were mixed after Greece approved a second package of creditors' austerity measures, paving the way for official bailout talks to begin.

The same was in Asia, where Japanese and Chinese stocks moved higher, but India and Taiwan closed lower.