US Stock Futures Rise On News Of GDP Revision

US stock futures recorded gains on Friday, following the lower-than-expected downward revision of economic growth for the second quarter. Investors are now awaiting the speech to be made by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke later in the day. Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 62 points to 10,029, those on the S&P 500 rose 7.70 points to 1,053 and the Nasdaq futures 15.25 points to 1,783.

The US government revised its reading of GDP growth in the second quarter to 1.6%. Although this represents a downward revision from the previously reported 2.4%, it was still better than what was expected.

The Fed Chairman is scheduled to speak at an annual economics conference in Wyo. Investors are looking forward to Bernanke’s view on the health and outlook of the US economy. This speech is also expected to indicate the monetary policy and what the Fed may need to do to curtail the economic slump.

Dell (NASDAQ: DELL) sweetened its bid for 3PAR (NYSE: PAR) to match HP's (NYSE: HPQ) bid, at $27 per share. 3PAR accepted Dell's latest offer, which values PAR at $1.8 billion and represents a premium of 180% over the storage company’s closing price of $9.65 the day prior to DELL’s initial bid last week.

European shares headed south in early trading. The Asian markets ended mixed, with Japan's benchmark Nikkei index adding 1.7% and the Shanghai Composite up 0.3%. The Hang Seng in Hong Kong was down 0.3%.

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