Before the bell: Stocks poised to rise amid EU summit

U.S. stocks were set for mild gains Thursday, as European leaders met in Brussels.
Before the summit's official start German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy reached consensus on a deal that would provide more aid to Greece.

Economy: The Labor Department's weekly report on initial unemployment claims climbed by 10,000 to 418,000 in latest week. Economists expected claims to rise to 411,000.
The Philadelphia Federal Reserve will release its July manufacturing survey at 14:00 GMT.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is scheduled to testify in front of the Senate Banking Committee starting Thursday.
Companies: Express Scripts (ESRX, Fortune 500) announced early Thursday morning it will buy Medco Health Solutions (MHS, Fortune 500) in a deal worth $29.1 billion. Shares of Medco jumped more than 20% in premarket trading.
Travelers (TRV, Fortune 500) reported a net loss of $364 million, or 88 cents per share, on revenue of $6.4 billion. The insurer said it had $1.1 billion in catastrophe losses due to extraordinary tornado activity in April and May.
Morgan Stanley (MS, Fortune 500) reported a net loss of 38 cents per share, on revenues of $9.3 billion for the second quarter. Analysts had expected the bank to post a loss of 64 cents a share.
Phone maker Nokia reported a second-quarter loss, but shares were up 3.1% in premarket trading.
AT&T (T, Fortune 500) topped analyst earnings estimates by one cent, reporting earnings of 60 cents per share on revenue of $31.5 billion.
After the bell, investors will get earnings results from Intel competitor Advanced Micro Devices (AMD, Fortune 500), as well as software maker Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500).