Futures fall on fears of potential Russian attack on Ukraine

[February 14, 2022]  (Reuters) - U.S. stock index futures fell nearly 1% on Monday, pointing to a fresh round of declines on Wall Street with investors rattled by warnings that Russia could invade Ukraine at any time.

The United States has said the threat of an invasion is imminent, while keeping diplomatic channels open and reaffirming its pledge to defend "every inch" of NATO territory.

Declines were across the board, with cyclical banks and industrials including JPMorgan Chase & Co, Boeing Co, Caterpillar Inc and Goldman Sachs Group Inc down between 1.4% and 1.9% in premarket trading.

Megacap growth firms including Meta Platforms Inc, Apple Inc, Microsoft Corp, Alphabet Inc and Tesla Inc shed between 1.1% and 2.3%.

The CBOE Market Volatility index, also known as Wall Street's fear gauge, shot up to its highest level in nearly three weeks.

Heightening geopolitical risks also hit global equity markets, with Asian stocks kicking off the day in a soft footing followed by a weak performance by European shares. [MKTS/GLOB]

Travel stocks including American Airlines and Carnival Corp also dropped over 2% each.

At 5:21 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis were down 273 points, or 0.79%, S&P 500 e-minis were down 39.75 points, or 0.9%, and Nasdaq 100 e-minis were down 150.5 points, or 1.06%.

(Reporting by Shreyashi Sanyal in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel)

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