American investors have today woken up on Thursday morning to find two multi-billion dollar transactions on their door-step, while in Europe many firms are still in defensive mode.

Thus, shares of H.J. Heinz Co. are surging by 20% after Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and 3G Capital agreed to buy the food giant for about $23bn. Now we know what Berkshire Co-Chief Executive Warren Buffet means when he says he is ready for 'another elephant.'

US Airways Group, for its part, has agreed to an $11bn merger with AMR Corp.'s American Airlines.

"The above not only reflects the current relative outperformance of the US economy, it may also be an excellent example of why US investors have traditionally had, and continue to hold, a very strong 'home bias.' That is to say, they are generally averse to embarking on non-US investments.

At times that has seemed like a very poor policy but at the moment, and given the recent gyrations in foreign exchange markets, it would seem that they may not have been too far 'off the mark'," comment analyst at Digital Look.

Despite the above positive news flow the main US equity market averages are now being called to open lower by roughly 0.3% on average.

That also comes despite the release of what, at first glance, are clearly better-than-expected figures on initial weekly unemployment claims out today before the 'opening bell'.

Stock of chip-equipment maker Applied Materials is also gaining higher after guiding higher for its second-quarter to between $1.81bn and $1.97bn.

PepsiCo has released better than expected quarterly results.

Front month West Texas crude futures are now rising by 0.27% to the $97.33 mark on the NYMEX.

10 year US Treasury yields are now rising by 1 basis point to the 2.04% level.

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