Wall St. set to rise on Apple results; Fed awaited

Wall Street was set to open higher on Wednesday as investors await the Federal Reserve's latest policy statement, while Apple's strong results allayed some concerns about its business in China. While the United States is starting to show signs of a slowdown, the global economy continues to remain fragile with China cutting rates further to stimulate growth. Apple's shares were up nearly 2 percent at $116.64 in premarket trading.U.S. stocks closed slightly lower on Tuesday after Ford's results missed expectations and energy stocks slid. Rite Aid shares lost some of their Tuesday's gains and were trading down 8.2 percent at $7.97, a day after Walgreens Boots Alliance said it would buy the smaller drugstore operator for $9.4 billion. Gilead Sciences was down 1.4 percent at $109.45 after the biotech company reported weak sales growth for its hepatitis C drug in the quarter.