Steady Start to Week for Stocks on Wall Street
A day before the U.S. elects a new president, premarket futures were in a holding pattern Monday as traders digested news of several merger setbacks and prepared for another week full of quarterly earnings statements.
Futures for the
S&P 500
were up 0.3 points at 967.60 andwere 0.2 points above fair value.
Nasdaq
futures were higher by21 points at 1343 and were 6.4 ahead of fair value.
Looking through corporate headlines, leveraged-buyout firm
Kohlberg Kravis & Roberts
was delaying plans to come public asthe credit crisis hurt its capitalization standing. KKR said in astatement it would hold off on buying Amsterdam-listed
KKR PrivateEquity
until next year.
In other merger news,
The Detroit News
reported that
Cerberus Capital
, which owns
Chrysler
, has ceaseddiscussions with
Nissan-Renault
because Cerberus intends onmerging with
General Motors
(GM) - Get Report
.
Soft-drink maker
PepsiCo
(PEP) - Get Report
announced it would invest$1 billion in China over the next four years in an effort to gain afoothold in emerging markets.
Boeing
(BA) - Get Report
, meanwhile, announced thata strike by the International Association of Machinists had endedafter the company and union signed a four-year contract.
As for earnings, insurer
PMI Group
(PMI)
reported a widerthird-quarter loss.
In terms of economic data, the census bureau is set to release itsconstruction spending figures for September. Also due out is theInstitute for Supply Management's October manufacturing index.
Shifting to commodities, crude oil was losing 57 cents to $67.24 abarrel. Gold was climbing $17.60 to $735.80.
Longer-dated U.S. Treasury securities were mixed. The 10-year wasup 4/32, yielding 3.95%. The 30-year was dropping 16/32 to yield4.36%. The dollar was rising vs. the yen but trading lower against theeuro and pound.
Abroad, European exchanges, including the FTSE in London and theDAX in Frankfurt, were mostly trading higher. In Asia, Japan's Nikkeiwas closed for a holiday, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng finished on theupside.
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