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Boeing ( BA ) slips after job-cut plans, jet delivery delay

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B. Riley Financial ( RILY ) soars after company says will sell unit

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Futures: Dow down 0.17%, S&P 500 up 0.15%, Nasdaq up 0.25%

(Updated at 07:10 a.m. ET/1110 GMT)

By Lisa Pauline Mattackal and Purvi Agarwal

Oct 14 (Reuters) -

U.S. stock index futures were mixed on Monday as investors

geared up for a week packed with third-quarter earnings reports

and economic data that will likely test stretched stock market

valuations.

Dow E-minis were down 72 points, or 0.17%, S&P

500 E-minis were up 8.5 points, or 0.15%, and Nasdaq 100

E-minis were up 50.75 points, or 0.25%.

Major financial companies kicked off the third-quarter

corporate earnings season on a broadly positive note on Friday,

with JPMorgan Chase ( JPM ), Wells Fargo ( WFC ) and BlackRock ( BLK )

rallying after the results.

Their gains propelled the Dow Jones Industrial Average

and the benchmark S&P 500 to record closing highs

in the previous session.

Still, with stock valuations stretched - the S&P 500 is

trading at 21.7 times forward earnings, versus a long-term

average of 15.7 - companies will be forced to justify them and

satisfy investors.

"While the bar for earnings overall (is) beating estimates,

valuations remain lofty," said Marc Ostwald, chief economist &

global strategist at ADM Investor Services International.

There would be "a very big focus" on AI investment and the

extent to which companies might delay capital expenditure, among

other metrics, due to uncertainty around the outcome of the

upcoming U.S. election, Ostwald said.

Forty-one S&P 500 companies are expected to report results

this week, including Bank of America ( BAC ), Citigroup ( C/PN ),

Johnson & Johnson ( JNJ ) and Netflix ( NFLX ).

Year-over-year third-quarter earnings growth for the S&P 500

is estimated at 4.9%, according to LSEG data on Friday.

Investors will also watch for crucial economic data this

week, notably September retail sales, which are due on Thursday,

for clues on the financial health of U.S. consumers.

Federal Reserve officials Christopher Waller and Neel

Kashkari are scheduled to speak through the day.

While traders have dialed back expectations for an outsized

50-basis-point rate cut at the Fed's November meeting after a

string of strong labor market data, bets on a 25-basis-point

reduction have stayed largely intact at 86.1%, according to the

CME Group's FedWatch tool.

Among single movers, planemaker Boeing ( BA ) slipped 2.1%

in premarket trading after the company flagged a

larger-than-expected Q3 loss on Friday and said it would cut

17,000 jobs and delay first deliveries of its 777X jet by a

year.

Investment bank B. Riley Financial ( RILY ) leapt 17.5%

after the company said it had agreed to sell its unit, Great

American Group, to asset management firm Oaktree Capital in a

$386-million deal.

U.S.-listed shares of Chinese firms such as Alibaba

and PDD Holdings ( PDD ) slipped more than 2% each as investors

were left guessing on the size of the overall fiscal stimulus

China announced on Saturday.

VF Corp ( VFC ) fell 3.1% after Wells Fargo ( WFC ) downgraded

the apparel retailer to "underweight" from "equal weight".

Cryptocurrency-linked stocks such as Coinbase

gained 3.9%, Riot Platforms ( RIOT ) added 3.5% and

MicroStrategy ( MSTR ) was up 4.7%, tracking gains in Bitcoin

.