US pre-open: Stocks mixed ahead of key inflation data

Wall Street futures were mixed ahead of the bell on Tuesday as market participants looked ahead to the release of key inflation data over the next few days.

As of 1230 BST, Dow Jones futures were down 0.15%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures had the indices opening 0.11% and 0.14% firmer, respectively.

The Dow closed 140.53 points lower on Monday amid renewed geopolitical tensions in the Middle East.

Trade Nation's David Morrison said: "There have been rumblings about the possibility of a retaliatory attack backed by Iran, or its proxies, on Israel. But it is difficult to assess how markets may react without knowing the scale of the response, and ultimately, its effects. Looking at the charts, these look fairly constructive as far as the US majors are concerned. The bulls will take comfort from the fact that the stock indices have managed to hold, and build, on Thursday’s large gains. But sentiment can shift in an instant, and markets feel quite febrile as investors prepare for this week’s economic data dump."

On the macro front, the National Federation of Independent Business' small business optimism index rose to 93.7 in July, up from 91.5 in June for the highest reading since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 but was still below the 50-year average of 98.25%.

Still to come, July's all-important producer price index will be out at 1330 BST, with investors expecting to see headline PPI increase by 0.2% month-on-month, up from a 0.1% decline in June.

Last month's consumer price index will be published on Wednesday, with a 0.2% increase also predicted there.

In the corporate space, Home Depot traded lower before the bell on the back of a H2 sales warning, with the group now expecting to report a 3-4% year-on-year decline in full-year comparable sales.

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com