U.S. stock futures fell slightly on Tuesday after retail giant Walmart posted better-than-expected earnings, but disappointing German data added to the economic gloom. Global.
Wall Street’s broad S&P 500 and tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 contracts fell 0.1% before the New York opening bell, cutting earlier losses.
Europe’s regional Stoxx 600 share index rose 0.3%. Germany’s Dax gained 0.5%, while London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.6%.
Those moves come after the world’s largest brick-and-mortar retailer Walmart reported frighteningly stronger quarterly numbers and released full-year guidance. The company – seen by many as a barometer for the health of US consumers – in late July issued its second profit warning in 10 weeks.
Shares of Walmart rose 3.8% in pre-market trading after it forecast a smaller annual loss than previously forecast. Stocks available in May have endured biggest drop in a day since 1987 when Walmart cut the guidelines for the first time.
Earlier on Tuesday, new survey results gave a bad warning about Germany’s outlook. Data from economic research group Zew showed that investment experts’ confidence in the eurozone’s largest economy deteriorated again in August. Negative 55.3 for August was lower than expected. last month’s number and consensus forecast is negative 53.8.
Separate data on Tuesday showed that the EU recorded a trade deficit of 24.6 billion euros in June, 4.6 billion euros higher than the expected 20 billion euros but lower than the 26.3 billion euros. euro recorded in May.
Central banks have shown in recent months that monetary policy tightening strategies will be led in part by signals given by economic data releases.
This has led market watchers to pay more attention to individual data points than in the past, said Altaf Kassam, Emea’s head of research and investment strategy at State Street Global Advisors.
“It will increase volatility and worries will increase due to lower liquidity in the summer,” he said. “Every data point will be scrutinized, which could lead to greater daily volatility.”
In Asian stock markets, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index closed down 1.1%, dragging down shares of food delivery group Meituan after Reuters reported that tech giant Tencent has plans to sell all or most of its 17% stake in the business.
That decline came despite a Stocks of Chinese real estate companies surgedabout reports that Beijing may order state-owned corporations to underwrite some developer bonds issued in the country’s domestic market.
Earlier in the day, Chinese shares fell after the country’s economic data showed retail sales and industrial output rose at a slower pace than economists expected, complicating global growth prospects. China’s central bank on Monday cut its medium-term lending rate by 0.1 percentage point to 2.75%.
On the commodity front, Brent crude rose 0.5% to $95.65 a barrel. A day earlier, the international oil benchmark fell more than 5% to as low as $92.78 in the latest sign of recession fears plaguing the market. The US benchmark West Texas Intermediate was up 0.8% on Tuesday at $88.89 a barrel, after sliding to its weakest since early February – before Russia invaded Ukraine.
U.S. government bonds were generally flat on Tuesday, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note generally flat at 2.8%.
The dollar added 0.3% against a basket of six other currencies.
