US STOCKS-US stock futures steady, indexes set for weekly gains; FedEx up

Sept 19 (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures stabilized on Friday, pausing after the main indexes rallied to record highs in the previous session, while parcel delivery company FedEx rose after beating quarterly earnings expectations.

FedEx FDX.N gained 5% before the bell after reporting quarterly profit and revenue above Wall Street estimates on Thursday, as cost-cutting and strength in domestic deliveries helped offset weaker international volumes.

Peer United Parcel Service UPS.N, which abandoned its bid for Mexican parcel firm Estafeta, also gained 1.2%.

Wall Street's three main indexes closed at record highs on Thursday, partly boosted by chipmaker Intel INTC.O after AI leader Nvidia NVDA.O decided to build a $5 billion stake in the company. Intel was down 2.2% in premarket trading on Friday.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's emphasis on the weakening labor market and indications of further monetary policy easing also buoyed investor sentiment.

The small-cap Russell 2000 .RUT closed at an all-time high on Thursday, its first since November 2021, on optimism that additional interest-rate cuts would improve the outlook for these smaller companies.

Futures tied to the index RTYc1 were little changed on Friday.

"We were expecting some wobbles around summer months and were in buy-the-dip camp, but the dip hasn't really come... any weakness in the economic data has been offset by expectations of more Fed easing," said Mohit Kumar, economist at Jefferies.

At 05:38 a.m. ET, Dow E-minis YMcv1 were up 10 points, or 0.02%, S&P 500 E-minis EScv1 were up 3.75 points, or 0.06%, and Nasdaq 100 E-minis NQcv1 were up 22.5 points, or 0.09%.

The three indexes were set for weekly gains, wrapping up the week with the Fed's first rate cut of 2025 and reviving optimism around AI-linked stock trading.

Markets will focus on a scheduled call between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to discuss TikTok.

Analysts expect some volatility from "triple witching", an event where options and futures linked to stock indexes and individual stocks are set to expire on the third Friday of the last month of the quarter.

Wall Street's three main indexes are in positive territory so far in September - a month deemed historically bad for U.S. equities. The benchmark S&P 500 has shed 1.4% on average in the month since 2000, according to data compiled by LSEG.

Comments from San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly will be parsed in the first media interaction after the Fed's Wednesday meeting.

In other stocks, Lennar LEN.N fell 2.9% after the homebuilder reported lower third-quarter profit and forecast fourth-quarter home deliveries below estimates.