Indications: U.S. stock futures, commodities rise

By Kate Gibson and Polya Lesova, MarketWatch

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) â€" U.S. stock futures gained on Tuesday, together with oil, gold and other commodities, as investors also digested details of a deal to temporarily extend tax cuts to all Americans.

“The approval of the extension of the tax breaks should bolster confidence and shopping, now that we don’t have the threat of higher tax withholdings heading into January,” Marc Pado, U.S. market strategist at Cantor Fitzgerald, wrote in a note.

“Santa has definitely arrived,” Pado added,

Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average /quotes/comstock/21b!f:dj\z10 (DJZ10 11,435, +82.00, +0.72%)  were up 84 points to 11,437 and S&P 500 futures /quotes/comstock/21m!f:sp\z10 (SPZ10 1,234, +12.10, +0.99%)  gained 11.5 points to 1,233.6.

Nasdaq 100 futures /quotes/comstock/21m!f:nd\z10 (NDZ10 2,214, +23.75, +1.08%)  rose 21.25 points to 2,211.75.

Obama announces tax deal

U.S. President Barack Obama announces a compromise with Republicans that will extend for two years tax cuts put in place by former President George W. Bush.

In Asia overnight, most equity markets finished higher, with the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong rising 0.8%. See Asia Markets.

European markets also posted gains.

U.S. stocks ended mostly lower on Monday, with the blue-chip Dow index /quotes/comstock/10w!i:dji/delayed (DJIA 11,362, -19.90, -0.17%)  dropping 0.2%.

Tax deal agreed

On Monday evening, President Barack Obama outlined a tentative deal with the Republican Party to extend tax cuts for all Americans for the next two years and renew unemployment benefits for millions of people.

While the president emphasized that there were elements of the deal he didn’t like, he said he preferred compromise over gridlock.

Late Monday, the Treasury Department said it had reached agreement to sell its about $2.4 billion in shares of Citigroup Inc. /quotes/comstock/13*!c/quotes/nls/c (C 4.45, 0.00, 0.00%)  common stock, its remaining holdings in the bank.

In the end, taxpayers will make a $12 billion profit on the federal bailout of Citigroup, which drew $45 billion in taxpayer support in late 2008 in a bailout begun under the Bush administration.

On Tuesday, 3M Co. /quotes/comstock/13*!mmm/quotes/nls/mmm (MMM 86.88, -0.06, -0.07%)   hiked its earnings outlook for 2011, with the industrial conglomerate and Dow component saying it also expected to expand through further acquisitions.

U.S.-listed shares of consumer-goods giant Unilever /quotes/comstock/13*!un/quotes/nls/un (UN 30.10, +0.10, +0.33%)   /quotes/comstock/13*!ul/quotes/nls/ul (UL 29.43, +0.07, +0.24%)  gained 3.2% in thin premarket trading. The firm was upgraded to overweight from underweight at Morgan Stanley on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, the Irish parliament was expected to vote on the government's austerity budget, the harshest in the country’s history and a condition for Ireland being able to tap an 85-billion-euro ($113 billion) bailout package put together by international lenders.

European stocks advanced on Tuesday, with France’s CAC 40 index /quotes/comstock/30t!i:px1 (FR:PX1 3,824, +75.23, +2.01%)  rising 2.1% in intraday trading. Ireland’s ISEQ stock index gained 1.4%. See Europe Markets.

In the currency markets, the U.S. dollar came under selling pressure, with the euro rising to $1.33375.

The dollar index /quotes/comstock/11j!i:dxy0 (DXY 79.27, -0.31, -0.38%) , which tracks the performance of the greenback against a basket of other major currencies, slipped to 79.291.

Elsewhere overseas, China’s official newspaper on Tuesday said the country would likely boost interest rates in the coming days in a continuing effort to tame inflation.

In New York, commodity prices advanced, with January crude-oil futures rising $1.24 to $90.62 a barrel and gold up nearly $16 to $1,431.90 an ounce.

Kate Gibson is a reporter for MarketWatch, based in New York. Polya Lesova is chief of MarketWatch’s London bureau.

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