The industry's profit growth sharply outpaced the rest of Corporate America the past 10 years, a trend unlikely to change any time soon even if Congress passes the overhaul now on Capitol Hill, experts say.

Among the shares expected to see active trade in Thursday's session are those of the retailers as well as Allstate, Cigna, Cisco, CareFusion, Dr Pepper Snapple, i2, MetroPCS, MF Global, Netsuite, News Corp., Qualcomm, Sirius XM, THQ and Time Warner Cable.

Among the shares expected to see active trade in Thursday's session are those of Starbucks, CBS, Nvidia and Nasdaq.

These issues have distinguished themselves with stable growth, earnings and dividends over a 10-year period.

U.S. stock futures added to early gains Tuesday after a slew of positive economic data, including an August jump in retail sales. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 40 points to 9,590. Those for the S&P 500 gained 4.3 points to 1,047.8, while Nasdaq 100 futures rose 6 points to 1,694.