NEW YORK (AP) -- Stock futures rose Tuesday ahead of an appearance by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Capitol Hill, with many looking for hints of new stimulus measures for the economy.
Goldman Sachs is also reporting strong-than-expected second-quarter earnings, sending shares of the banking sector higher.
Dow Jones industrial average futures rose 44 points to 12,692. Standard & Poor's 500 futures tacked on 4.9 points to 1,352.30 and Nasdaq futures added 11.25 points to 2,582.75.
Bernanke will give his semiannual report to the Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday and to the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday.
A lot of people are hoping that Bernanke will signal another round of bond purchases after the first two government injections sent markets soaring.
This time, Bernanke goes before Congress with the job market slumping and more evidence that both consumers and businesses are growing anxious about the economy.
On Monday, the latest government data showed that consumers' spending fell in June, the third straight month of declines. That is particularly ominous because the last time that happened was in the fall of 2008 as the financial crisis spread across the globe.
Earnings season is in full gear this week and the results so far have been mixed.
Goldman Sachs beat Wall Street expectations, yet net income slid 11 percent as more clients steered clear of extraordinarily volatile markets. Johnson & Johnson saw its net income halved on slowing sales and litigation costs, among other things.
The Coca-Cola Co. wrestled with rising costs for ingredients and its second-quarter net earnings slipped, though its revenue is up 3 percent thanks in part to booming business overseas.
Prices are rising for everyone, though mildly.
The Labor Department said Tuesday that overall consumer prices were unchanged in June thanks to falling gas prices. Food prices edged up 0.2 percent after a flat reading in May.
Later Tuesday, Yahoo Inc. posts its quarterly earnings after making a surprise announcement Monday that it had hired an executive from rival Google to turn the company around.
Yahoo has not seen the same revenue growth as Google, and Facebook is gobbling up its share of ad sales as well.
