US Markets May Open Lower: Oil Price Falls, Gold Down

A lower start is likely for U.S markets as major U.S. stock index futures were slightly down Thursday morning as investor-attention moved to corporate earnings and trade issues.

At around 2:25 a.m. ET, Dow futures (Dow Jones Industrial average) slipped 50 points, hinting a negative open of more than 62 points. Futures of the S&P and Nasdaq were also downbeat.

The market’s focus is shifting to the talks planned in Beijing next week. According to U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, both countries are aiming to reach a deal. There is a March 2 deadline for increasing U.S. tariffs on Chinese products.

Earning results of Fiat, Sanofi, T-Mobile, Twitter, Expedia, News Corp, and Western Union will come up on Thursday.

Oil prices plunged Thursday after U.S. crude inventories rose and production levels held at record levels, but OPEC's supply cuts and U.S sanctions on Venezuela oil helped prices.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at $53.84 per barrel at 0247 GMT, down 0.3 percent, from the last settlement.

International Brent crude futures were down 0.4 percent, at $62.43 per barrel.

U.S. crude oil inventories jumped by 1.3 million barrels in the week that ended Feb. 1 to 447.21 million barrels, per data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) on Wednesday.

The United States is currently the world's largest oil producer, ahead of Russia and Saudi Arabia.

Gold fell to a week’s low on Thursday, hit by a stronger dollar. Rising anxieties over slowing global economic growth and chances of yet another U.S. government shutdown has kept the yellow metal above the key $1,300 level.

Spot gold fell 0.2 percent to $1,303.64 per ounce by 0341 GMT, to the lowest since Jan. 29. The U.S. gold futures also slid 0.5 percent at $1,307.30.

Mixed trend in Asia stocks, Europe down

Mixed trends prevailed in Asia stocks. Hopes are up on U.S.-China trade deal as negotiations are to continue. Japan's Nikkei 225 slipped 0.59 percent to close at 20,751.28. The stocks of Softbank Group jumped 17.73 percent after it announced share buy back up to 600 billion yen ($5.46 billion) in the largest ever exercise.

European stocks were slightly down. The Stoxx 600 was down 0.2 percent during morning deals with most sectors and bourses in negative territory.

The losses were led by Europe's media stocks that fell more than 1.7 percent. Among individual stocks, Sweden's ICA Gruppen zoomed to the top of the European index after a rise in fourth-quarter net sales. The shares jumped more than 6 percent.