Stock futures off ahead of data, banks in cross hairs
Stock index futures fell on Wednesday, signaling the previous session's oversold rally may be a one-day wonder, ahead of data on consumer prices, manufacturing and industrial production.
Pressuring financial stocks in Europe, Moody's placed the credit ratings of French banks under review for a downgrade, citing their exposure to Greek debt.
Euro zone ministers failed to agree on how to share the costs of a new bailout for Greece, squeezing risky assets like equities and the euro currency.
Yesterday was a counter-trend rally, based on a couple of pieces of news coming out slightly better than worst case, said Jack de Gan, chief investment officer at Harbor Advisory Corp in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
Wednesday's batch of data could help confirm the idea that a slowdown in the recovery is temporary.
De Gan said significantly weak data would raise market expectations of an extension of the Federal Reserve's asset-buying program that spurred gains in recent months, though he cautioned expectations could be misplaced.
S&P 500 futures fell 6.1 points and were below fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration of the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures lost 63 points and Nasdaq 100 futures dropped 9.75 points.
The S&P 500 is expected by many market participants to test its March low near the 1,250 level as economic data continues to support the idea a economic recovery was in question. The index closed at 1,287.87 on Tuesday, down 6 percent from its near three-year high hit May 2.
These five to seven percent declines are very, very common. We should be getting one of these every three months, De Gan said. We've been spoiled in the last 28 months; this is not unusual at all.
Consumer prices in the United States likely stalled in May, brought on by weaker commodity prices that could ease some pressure on the Federal Reserve to start tightening monetary policy. The Labor Department will release the May consumer price index at 8:30 a.m. EDT, with economists expecting a 0.1 percent rise, compared with April's 0.4 percent increase.
The New York Federal Reserve releases its Empire State Manufacturing Survey for June also at 8:30 a.m. Economists expect a reading of 12.50, compared with 11.88 in May.
The Fed releases industrial production and capacity utilization data for May at 9:15 a.m. EDT. Economists in a Reuters survey expect a 0.2 percent increase in production and a reading of 77.0 percent for capacity utilization.
On Tuesday, the Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> gained 123.14 points, or 1.0 percent, to 12,076.11. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.SPX> rose 16.04 points, or 1.3 percent, to 1,287.87. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.IXIC> advanced 39.03 points, or 1.5 percent, to 2,678.72.
(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos; editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
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