Wall St set to open lower on euro zone deal doubts
Wall Street stocks were set to fall at the open on Monday on lingering concerns a deal over economic integration in Europe will not be enough to keep the region's two-year sovereign debt crisis from spreading further.
Rating agency Moody's said Monday that last week's summit did not produce decisive initiatives and left the euro area prone to further shocks, and it will revisit the ratings of European Union nations in the first.
Also, Standard & Poor's chief economist said time was running out for the currency bloc to resolve its debt problems and that it might need another financial shock to get it moving.
Last week, S&P put 15 euro zone countries on a watch for a potential credit rating downgrade.
Markets are questioning the agreement reached last week, said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital in New York.
It is certainly a long-term positive but in the short term it doesn't fix the situation.
The European Union has decided to set stricter budget rules for the single currency area and to provide up to 200 billion euros in bilateral loans to the International Monetary Fund in response to the turmoil.
S&P 500 futures fell 11 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 dropped 95 points, and Nasdaq 100 futures lost 12.75 points.
All three major indexes ended Friday with a winning week.
The cost of insuring euro zone sovereign debt against default rose and the yield on 5-year Italian bonds rose above 7 percent reflecting market unease with last week's deal.
U.S. bank shares could fall during the regular session as investors assess the possibility of tighter credit in Europe. Bank of America Corp
An index of European bank shares <.SX7P> fell 2.7 percent.
Resource-related stocks will also be in focus as U.S. crude oil futures fell 1.5 percent on deepening concern over the prospects for the euro zone, and copper prices dropped more than 2 percent to a near two-week low.
Alcoa Inc
Last week, the Dow rose 1.4 percent, the S&P gained 0.9 percent and the Nasdaq was up 0.8 percent.
(Reporting By Rodrigo Campos; editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
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