US STOCKS-Wall Street set for new highs on strong data, earnings

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* U.S. housing starts race to 13-year high in December
* Schlumberger rises after Q4 earnings beat
* Rail road operators CSX, Kansas City down after results
* Futures up: Dow 0.31%, S&P 0.26%, Nasdaq 0.45%

(Adds comment, updates prices)
By Sruthi Shankar
Jan 17 (Reuters) - U.S. stock indexes were set to scale
fresh record highs on Friday, on optimism over corporate
earnings, fresh economic data and indications of resilience in a
Chinese economy battered by a prolonged trade war with the
United States.
Investor sentiment has brightened this week after the
world's top two economies took the first step in calling a truce
to their 18-month tariff dispute by sealing a Phase 1 trade
deal.
The three main stock indexes closed at record highs on
Thursday, with the S&P 500 surging past the 3,300-mark for the
first time, also boosted by a rally in technology stocks and
strong U.S. retail sales data.
In the final minutes of the trading session on Thursday,
Google-parent Alphabet Inc GOOGL.O became the fourth U.S.
company to top a market value of over $1 trillion.
Spurring gains in global stocks for a fifth day, data showed
the world's second-largest economy ended 2019 on a somewhat
firmer note, even as economic growth cooled to its weakest in
nearly 30 years in the last year. Further helping stock futures, U.S. homebuilding surged to a
13-year high in December, suggesting the housing market recovery
was back on track amid low mortgage rates. "There's a lot of enthusiasm out there and it is a
combination of earnings and strong data that is supporting the
market," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Spartan
Capital Securities in New York.
"From a technical viewpoint, the market is a bit overbought
and there is a possibility that the rally is going to exhaust
itself at one point."
After an upbeat showing from banks earlier this week,
oilfield service provider Schlumberger NV SLB.N reported a
slightly better-than-expected quarterly profit, sending its
shares up 2.1% in premarket trading. At 8:58 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis 1YMcv1 were up 90 points, or
0.31%. S&P 500 e-minis EScv1 were up 8.75 points, or 0.26% and
Nasdaq 100 e-minis NQcv1 were up 41 points, or 0.45%.
Among other stocks, Qualcomm Inc's QCOM.O shares rose 1.3%
after Citigroup upgraded the stock to "buy" from "neutral".
International Business Machines Corp IBM.N dropped 1.2%
after Morgan Stanley downgraded the stock to "equal weight",
saying information technology budgets are under pressure in 2020
and that are set to hit the hardware sector the most.
The Dow Jones Transports index .DJT could come under
pressure after disappointing earnings updates from J B Hunt
Transport Services Inc JBHT.O , Kansas City Southern KSU.N
and CSX Corp CSX.O .