Futures flat to lower; retailers eyed

Stock futures pointed to a flat to slightly weaker opening on Thursday, with investors watching same-store sales from retailers for signs of a spending slowdown.

Warehouse club Costco Wholesale Corp. reported sales at stores open at least a year that missed analysts' targets.

In a sign of weakness in the housing market, luxury home builder Toll Brothers Inc. (NYSE:TOL - News) said it expects to report a 19 percent drop in home-building revenue.

Shares of The Walt Disney Co. (NYSE:DIS - News) rose 2.5 percent late on Wednesday after the company reported quarterly earnings that beat analysts' expectations.

"We're looking at a mixed to lower opening. The market is going to focus on earnings and retailers, which are reporting sales today," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Avalon Partners in New York. "I think the market will continue to spin its wheels today."

Standard & Poor's 500 futures (SPc1) were down 2 points but were about even with fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract.

Dow Jones industrial average futures (DJc1) were down 5 points and Nasdaq 100 (NDc1) futures were down 5 points.

Shares of Disney, a Dow component, climbed to $36.38 in electronic extended-hours trading from a close at $35.48 on the New York Stock Exchange.

Costco reported a 2 percent rise in January sales at its stores open at least a year, below analysts' expectations for an increase of 3.2 percent.

European shares were slightly lower as investors digested an announcement from HSBC (LSE:HSBA.L - News), Europe's biggest bank, that its bad debt charge last year would be about $1.8 billion higher than expected as problems grew in its U.S. mortgage lending.

Also after Wednesday's close, shares of Affymetrix Inc. (NasdaqGS:AFFX - News), which makes microchips used in genetic research and drug development, rose 3.7 percent after the company reported stronger-than-expected quarterly results.

On Wednesday, technology stocks rose as Cisco Systems Inc.'s (NasdaqGS:CSCO - News) profit and outlook reinforced optimism over earnings, while blue chips ended little changed as an oil price drop weighed on energy shares.

The Dow Jones industrial average (DJI:^DJI - News) inched up just 0.56 of a point to end at 12,666.87, after earlier touching an intraday record high at 12,700.28. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (^SPX - News) gained 2.02 points, or 0.14 percent, to finish at 1,450.02, just shy of its six-year high at 1,452.99 reached earlier in the day, while the Nasdaq Composite Index (Nasdaq:^IXIC - News) climbed 19.01 points, or 0.77 percent, to close at 2,490.50.