Futures slide further as global growth fears mount

[December 10, 2018]   By Medha Singh

(Reuters) - U.S. equity futures fell about 0.4 percent to six-week lows on Monday, as a global selloff continued on signs of cooling growth and worries that escalating tensions between the United States and China could scuttle their fragile trade truce.

The three main indexes slid 4.5 percent or more last week in their biggest weekly tumble since March, pushing the benchmark S&P 500 <.SPX> and the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average <.DJI> into the red for the year.

Washington has set a March 1 "hard deadline" to successfully wrap up talks with Beijing over their trade spat, failing which a higher tariff rate will kick in, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said on Sunday.

That comes when investors are fretting that the arrest of a top Huawei Technologies Co Ltd [HWT.UL] executive at the behest of the United States could inflame tensions with China, though both the White House and Chinese state media have said the arrest and trade talks are separate events.

"The arrest of Huawei Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou in Canada, following a U.S. extradition request, has created serious concerns that the truce between the two Presidents may end before the 90 days agreed upon," Hussein Sayed, chief market strategist at FXTM said in a client note.

"This is occurring at a time when the global economy is experiencing a slowdown - and here comes the big threat."

After U.S. jobs data missed expectations on Friday, fresh evidence of the impact of the trade war on the world economy came in the form of Japan's economy shrinking last quarter and more crucially, China posting far weaker-than-expected November exports and imports.

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., December 7, 2018. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

At 7:26 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis <1YMc1> were down 101 points, or 0.41 percent. S&P 500 e-minis <ESc1> were down 10.75 points, or 0.41 percent and Nasdaq 100 e-minis <NQc1> were down 26.75 points, or 0.40 percent.

Futures for the small-cap Russell 2000 <RTYc1>, which is less sensitive than its larger peers to global worries such as trade, fell 0.20 percent. The index's 5.6 percent tumble last week was its steepest in nearly three years.

Among stocks, shares of Qorvo Inc <QRVO.O> and Skyworks Solutions Inc <SWKS.O> fell nearly 1.5 percent in premarket trading after KeyBanc downgraded the two Apple Inc <AAPL.O> suppliers due to further weakening of iPhone demand trends. Apple shares dropped 0.6 percent.

U.S. Labor Department report at 10 a.m. ET (1500 GMT) is expected to show job openings fell to 6.995 million in October from 7.009 million in September.

(Reporting by Medha Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)

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