Wall Street set for negative open

Stocks on Wall Street are set to fall out of bed with a bump today, joining the general retreat of equity markets worldwide. Based on spread betting quotes, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is set to plunge 377 points to 34,311; the S&P 500 is expected to tumble 34 points to 4,293 and the Nasdaq 100 is tipped to surrender 56 points at 14,625. Investors remain perturbed at the coronavirus pandemic and also the outlook for third-quarter earnings updates. “Last week’s earnings reports have by and large been positive, but attention is now shifting to what comes next in terms of the outlook, as Covid cases rise, and here the economic picture is less clear,” said CMC’s Michael Hewson. “There was a great deal of optimism over the summer reopening; however, as we look ahead to the rest of the year and look at how Delta variant infections are rising, some of that optimism is dissipating, prompting the question as to where we go next for Q3 earnings expectations. “One of the big drivers of inflation concerns over the past few months has been the steady rise in oil prices, as concerns about demand overshooting supply helped to drive prices to three-year highs. At the weekend OPEC+ appear to have put their difference to one side and agreed a deal to increase output by up to 400k barrels a day on a monthly basis starting in August, and continue until production has been restored to the level it was pre-pandemic,” Hewson added. As noted by Daiwa Capital Markets, this week’s US economic diary is relatively sparse. Today will see the release of the NAHB housing survey for July, which will set the tone for the housing-focus data released over the remainder of the week. “That data includes tomorrow’s housing starts and building permits report for June, in which Daiwa America’s Mike Moran expects to see a modest decline in starts amidst the recent moderation of new home sales and an associated rise in inventories; however, Mike expects Thursday’s existing home sales report to be more robust – albeit well shy of last year’s highs – and is picking a 3.4%M/M [month-on-month] rebound in sales in June on the back of the already-published rebound in pending home sales in May,” Daiwa said. Economists seem to be queuing up to say how dull it is going to be on the macroeconomic front. “We are now entering the Fed’s ‘quiet period’ where senior officials avoid talking about the monetary policy outlook, while the data calendar is relatively thin so we are not expecting major market moves to be driven from the US macro news flow over the coming week. Nonetheless, it still paints a positive picture of US economic prospects with housing activity picking up after a recent quiet patch with a lack of housing supply continuing to support house price growth,” according to ING. All that “very little happening” and yet the market is tanking. Three things to watch for on Monday: Companies in the earnings diary at the start of the week include computing giant IBM Corp (NYSE:IBM), real estate investor Prologis Inc (NYSE:PLD) and paint maker PPG Industries Inc (NYSE:PPG) Shares in video conferencing firm Zoom Video Communications Inc (NASDAQ:ZM) could draw attention after it agreed to buy cloud contact centre software firm Five9 Inc (NASDAQ:FIVN) in an all-share deal worth nearly US$15bn Oil stocks and prices could also be in focus after the OPEC+ group of countries agreed a deal to boost production