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Futures up: Dow 0.09%, S&P 500 0.38%, Nasdaq 0.86%

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Jobless claims estimated to rise to 215,000 in Jan.

5-ended week

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Investors shift from tech to undervalued sectors amid

market

rotation

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TSMC predicts robust growth, boosts U.S. chip tool stocks

(Updates with analyst comments, prices)

By Medha Singh and Pranav Kashyap

Jan 15 (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures ticked

higher on Thursday after TSMC delivered a knockout quarter,

sparking a fresh rally in chipmakers, while Wall Street ‌braces

for earnings from the financial heavyweights.

The bounce follows a bruising session that left the major

indexes reeling. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq

posted their sharpest drops of ​the year so far, while the Dow

pared midday losses to finish essentially unchanged.

Chip stocks such as Nvidia ( NVDA ) rose ‍1.5%, while

Broadcom ( AVGO ) and Micron gained 2.5% and 3.5%,

respectively, in premarket trading on Thursday.

Chipmaking ⁠tool companies Applied Materials ( AMAT ) and ⁠Lam

Research rose 8.3% each, and KLA gained 6.3%.

The gains came on the back of Taiwan's TSMC, the

world's main producer of advanced AI chips, strong results ‌and a

sturdy growth outlook that signaled that more U.S. manufacturing

capacity ​is on the way.

U.S.-listed shares of TSMC jumped 6.7%.

BlackRock ( BLK ), the world's largest asset manager, gained

2% after reporting a higher fourth-quarter profit, as a rally in

markets lifted fee income and pushed its ⁠assets under management

to a record.

Goldman Sachs ( GS ) fell 0.2% and ‍Morgan Stanley

rose 0.9% ​before their quarterly reports that would wrap

up earnings from major Wall Street lenders.

Financial stocks have come under pressure this week on

worries over the impact of a proposed one-year cap on credit

card interest rates at ‍10%, even as some of the banking giants

posted robust profit growth.

Investors are also rotating out of richly valued tech and

other growth stocks to more unloved parts of the market that

hold attractive valuations.

S&P 500 materials and industrials indexes

clinched new peaks, while real estate and

energy hit multi-month highs this week, as the

tech-laden S&P 500 slid to a two-week low.

The S&P 400 mid-cap and Russell 2000 small also

clinched new peaks this week.

At 06:52 a.m. ET, Dow E-minis were up ​45 points, ‍or

0.09%, S&P 500 E-minis were up 26.75 points, or 0.38%,

and Nasdaq 100 E-minis were up 221.5 points, or 0.86%.

With geopolitical risks and economic indicators having

little sway over equities, investors are zeroing in on

fundamentals ​as the fourth-quarter earnings season gets

underway, which may reveal whether the market's historic rally

still has legs.

Analysts expect S&P 500 companies to report 8.8% average

growth in quarterly profit from a year ago, according to LSEG

IBES data.

Meanwhile, the Labor Department's data at 8:30 a.m. ET is

expected to show weekly jobless claims rose to 215,000 in the

week ended January 5.

Traders are still pricing in at least two rate cuts by

year-end, according to LSEG.

Markets will also be closely watching for fresh signals from

policymakers, including Federal Reserve board Governor Michael

Barr and ​regional Fed chiefs Raphael Bostic, Tom Barkin, and

Jeffrey Schmid. They are scheduled to speak later in the day.

"We expect the labor market to remain soft, and two

additional payroll reports ahead of the March policy meeting are

likely to be followed by a 25-basis-point interest rate cut,

which should continue ‍to support stocks," UBS analysts said.

(Reporting by Medha Singh and Pranav Kashyap in Bengaluru;

Editing by Maju Samuel and Shinjini Ganguli)