Preopen Trading: Downside Pressure Builds Before Open

In premarket action, Abbot Labs(ABT Quote) was buzzing at $46.50, up $3.25 from Friday's closing price of $43.25. Last week, the drug maker received approval from the Food and Drug Administration Approval for its HIV cocktail Kaletra.

AT&T(T Quote) was also getting connected in the early going after The Wall Street Journal reported that British Telecom(BTY Quote) and the U.S. long distance carrier would negotiate merging some of their businesses. AT&T was lately trading at $32.25, unchanged from Friday's finish.

Elsewhere in the tech sector, Oracle(ORCL Quote) continues to lose ground after last week's first-quarter earnings report. Although the software giant's numbers beat the street's estimates, software sales were slower than expected. Oracle was at $78.25, down 6 cents from Friday's close of $78.31.

Stocks are set for downticks at the opening bell. The S&P 500 futures on Globex lately were off 2.20 to 1481.30, about 4 points below fair value as calculated by Prudential Securities. Fair value is a good gauge of how stocks will perform in the early going.

The Nasdaq 100 futures were down 20.50 points to 3698.00, about 37 points below fair value, as calculated by TheStreet.com, and indicating that tech stocks are poised to open to the downside.

Europe's major indices were tentatively mixed, with France's CAC 40 down 1.3%, Germany's Xetra Dax down 0.8% and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 0.1% higher. Japan's Nikkei 225 lost 0.9% overnight, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng slipped 4.2% and Korea's Kospi plunged 8% (see today's Asian Markets Update for more).