Stock Futures Point to Rebound

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Stock futures were pointing to a financials-supported rebound Friday, after the previous session's deep selloff, as investors shrugged off Moody's downgrade of the major banks.

Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average were gaining 44 points, or 45.4 points above fair value, at 12,546. Futures for the S&P 500 were rising by 5 points, or 4.1 points above fair value, at 1323, and futures for the Nasdaq 100 were ahead by 5.5 points, or 6.1 points above fair value, at 2557.

Stocks suffered their worst single-day drop in three weeks Thursday as investors were spooked by a gloomy batch of global economic data, a bearish trading call by Goldman Sachs and disappointment with the outcome of the Federal Reserve's latest policy meeting.

On Thursday evening, Moody's downgraded fifteen of the biggest global banks, but they followed with a rally.

Citigroup(C) , Bank of America(BAC) and Morgan Stanley(MS) were among the banks who saw their credit ratings slashed as expected, and they were rising by a respective 1.1%, 1.5% and 2.6% in premarket trading Friday.

The Hong Kong Hang Seng index closed lower by 1.4% and the Nikkei in Japan closed down 0.29%.

The FTSE in London was slipping by 0.75% and the DAX in Germany was declining by 0.53% as business confidence in the biggest eurozone economy fell to its lowest point in more than two years.

European leaders are meeting in Rome Friday to discuss a unanimous plan on bringing relief to the eurozone debt crisis. One area of contention going into the meetings is the proposal to tax financial transactions and to have banks foot the bill for their own bailouts.

In Spain, independent audits indicate that the country's banks will, under duress, require up to €62 billion in financial support, below the earlier foreseen €100 billion in eurozone bailouts.

Friday's U.S. economic calendar is empty.

August crude oil futures were edging up 53 cents to $78.73 a barrel. August gold futures were rising $4.70 to $1,570.20 an ounce.