France's CAC 40 lost 0.6% in early trading to 7,489.17, while Germany's DAX declined 0.5% to 15,799.39. Britain's FTSE 100 dipped 0.3% to 7,869.14. But U.S. shares were set to drift higher with Dow futures up 0.1% at 7,869.14. S&P 500 futures rose 0.4% to 4,109.75."From a banking crisis still hovering just beneath the surface to the realization Russia has long-range missiles that are incredibly accurate that no one has the capacity to stop, to the sharply higher China-U.S.
On Wall Street on Tuesday, the S&P 500 fell 1.6%, breaking out of a weekslong lull. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1%, while the Nasdaq composite sank 2% to 11,799.16.Looking ahead, forecasts are for the worst drop in S&P 500 earnings since the spring of 2020, when the pandemic froze the global economy. So Wall Street is focused just as much, if not more, on what companies say about their future prospects as what they say about the past three months.
A report Tuesday showed that confidence among consumers fell more sharply in April than expected, down to its lowest level since July. That's a discouraging signal when consumer spending makes up the biggest part of the U.S. economy.