Futures flat as impact from UK election seen as limited

[June 09, 2017]  By Tanya Agrawal

(Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures were little changed on Friday as the shocking result of the British general election seemed to have a limited impact on investor sentiment.

British voters dealt a devastating blow to Prime Minister Theresa May in a snap election, wiping out her parliamentary majority, just weeks before Brexit negotiations are due to begin.

With no clear winner emerging, May said she will ask Queen Elizabeth for permission to form a government, while her Labour rival Jeremy Corbyn said May should step down and that he wanted to form a minority government.

Analysts said the impact from the election on the U.S. market would be limited.

"I don't think the shock of having a hung parliament or having to cobble together a coalition ​is really something that is going to upend U.S. assets," said Jason Ware, chief investment officer at Albion Financial in Salt Lake City, Utah.

"Going back a year ago when we were facing what seemed a pivotal moment in the UK with Brexit ... people thought the financial markets would be a disaster and it turned out not to be true."

European stocks were choppy on Friday with the pan-European STOXX 600 <.STOXX> index down slightly while UK's internationally facing blue chip FTSE 100 <.FTSE> index outperforming with a gain of 0.5 percent.

Wall Street ended mostly flat on Thursday after former FBI Director James Comey's testimony was seen by investors as having no smoking gun that could affect Donald Trump's presidency.

Comey said Trump fired him to undermine an investigation into Russian meddling into last November's U.S. election and while he had no doubt that Russia interfered with the election, he was confident that no votes had been altered.

The market's concern is whether the Trump administration can put the investigation behind it and revive momentum for its agenda of lower taxes and looser regulations.

Bets on that agenda are partly behind a rally, which has driven stock indexes to record highs.

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., June 2, 2017. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

Shares of Endo International <ENDP.O> tumbled 14.2 percent to $11.82 in premarket trading after the FDA asked the drugmaker to withdraw from the market its long-lasting opioid painkiller for public health reasons.

Chipmaker Nvidia <NVDA.O> rose 2.1 percent to $163.21 after brokerages reiterated their bullish view on the stock.

Fellow chipmaker AMD <AMD.O> was also up 1.9 percent at $13.15 after brokerage Longbow began coverage of the stock with a "neutral" rating.

DuPont Fabros Technology <DFT.N> jumped 13 percent to $62.55 after Digital Realty Trust <DLR.N> said it would buy the fellow data center operator for an enterprise value of about $7.6 billion.

Futures snapshot at 6:58 a.m. ET (1058 GMT):

Dow e-minis <1YMc1> were up 19 points, or 0.09 percent, with 14,151 contracts changing hands.

S&P 500 e-minis <ESc1> were up 2 points, or 0.08 percent, with 103,231 contracts traded.

Nasdaq 100 e-minis <NQc1> were up 0.5 points, or 0.01 percent, on volume of 18,796 contracts.

(Reporting by Tanya Agrawal in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D'Silva)

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