U.S. stock futures pointed to a red open on Wall
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on Wall Street on Friday, as a further slump in oil prices continued to
dampen the investment mood and fanned fears of an imminent stock-market correction.
Later in the day, reports on consumer sentiment and producer prices will be watched by investors, after surprisingly strong retail-sales data came in on Thursday.
Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJH5, -0.67% lost 103 points, or 0.6%, to 17,406, while those for the S&P 500 index SPH5, -0.42% slid 10.30 points, or 0.5%, to 2,013.70. Futures for the Nasdaq 100 NDH5, -0.77% gave up 34.75 points, or 0.8%, to 4,198.00.
Nour Al-Hammoury, chief market strategist at ADS Securities, said the S&P could fall to as low as 2,000 if the index breaks below the current support level at 2,019.
Additionally, he noted that the gold/oil ratio — which he argued is negatively correlated with the S&P and Dow average — has spiked, suggesting that a “major correction in the global equities is under way, especially in S&P500.”
Stocks on Thursday broke a three-day losing streak, after the robust consumer-spending data.
Oil blues: Oil futures continued their rout on Friday, with crude oil for January CLF5, -0.85% briefly sliding below $59 a barrel for the first time in more than five-and-a-half years, after the International Energy Agency cut its 2015 global oil-demand view by 230,000 barrels a day. Futures pared losses later in the morning to trade at $59.29 a barrel. Brent LCOF5, -0.61% was also moving lower in London, down 38 cents at $63.31 a barrel.
Economic news: The highlight on the data calendar is the University of Michigan consumer sentiment index for December, due at 9:55 a.m. Eastern Time, which will be closely watched to gauge the strength of the U.S. economy.
Investors will also be watching the producer-price index out at 8:30 a.m. Eastern.
Stocks to watch: Several tech majors were down ahead of the open, with shares of Apple Inc. AAPL, -0.38% off 0.7%, Microsoft Corp. MSFT, -0.61% 1% lower and Facebook inc FB, -0.45% down 1.1%.
Abbott Laboratories ABT, +0.20% lost 2% in premarket action after the company said it completed the takeover of Russian pharmaceutical company Veropharm.
Other markets: Asia markets closed mixed, with the Nikkei breaking a three-day losing streak. European stocks were mired in deep red. In currencies, the ruble USDRUB, +1.89% hit a fresh record low against the dollar, leading the Bank of Russia to intervene. Metals were mostly on the decline.