Wall Street futures are eyeing an upbeat start to the week, despite that recent pessimism over trade tariffs. Asian markets were scrabbling around for support during the session after Donald Trump threatened levies on Chinese imports, but the bigger risk for US stocks here is the scope of any retaliatory measures from Beijing. This is one story that will likely continue to run in the weeks ahead.
Friday’s better than expected payrolls - plus the boost in average earnings - only provided some short lived support at the time, but again this is certainly something worth cheering for now and is arguably being factored into pre-market gains.
It’s been a relatively quiet start to the day in Europe although the Italian MIB index is faring well over optimism that the new government’s plans for economic reform will soon yield results. The July UK GDP figure also came in above expectations and collectively prints like this are helping just take a little pace out of the US dollar. Any modest greenback weakness could again translate into higher equity valuations.
Ahead of the open we’re calling the Dow up 110 at 26027 and the S&P up 13 at 2885