U.S. stock-index futures added to gains early Thursday after the European Central Bank kicked off its news conference after announcing a schedule for a gradual winding down of its easy-money policies. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 100 points, or 0.4% at 25,304, those for the S&P 500 index added 0.3% at 2,787, while futures for the Nasdaq-100 advanced by 0.4% at 7,256. The ECB left its benchmark eurozone interest-rates unchanged but the attention was more keenly focused on the central bank's move to join the Federal Reserve in beginning to tighten policy in the aftermath of the 2007-09 financial crisis. The the ECB kept its deposit rate unchanged at minus-0.4% and said it wouldn't raise interest rates "at least through the summer of 2019." On Wednesday, the Fed raised its policy rate a quarter of a percentage point to a range between 1.75% and 2% and penciled in a total of four rate increases in 2018.
Read the full story: U.S. stock market climbs after solid data, ECB announcement