Wall Street may have crept a little higher during Thursday’s trade, with the advance retail sales figure for October impressing, which has in turn the market at least a little to cheer.
Sustaining the upside here however continues to look difficult. Index futures are pointing towards a slightly softer start, the idea that trade talks between the US and China were making progress seems to have been side-lined and on top of this, there’s the mounting political uncertainty in the UK surrounding Brexit.
The situation in London is becoming so pronounced that ripples are set to be felt across the Atlantic. Investors are buying UK government gilts as a safe haven play, which in turn is driving up corresponding yields for US Treasuries and in turn will act as a catalyst to see money cycle from stocks into bonds on Wall Street.
US economic data is relatively light and - against the overall backdrop - seems unlikely to provide any meaningful direction. Market sentiment has been steadily worsening in recent weeks – there’s no sign of any let-up emerging yet.
Ahead of the open, we’re calling the Dow down 14 at 25275 and the S&P 500 down 5 at 2725.