US pre-open: Futures in the red, major indices on track for losing week
Wall Street futures had stocks opening lower ahead of the bell on Friday, putting major indices on a course for a losing week.
As of 1215 BST, Dow Jones futures were down 0.66%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures had the indices opening 0.75% and 0.91% lower, respectively.
The Dow closed 173.27 points lower on Thursday after market participants digested a number of key data points.
FedEx was in focus prior to the open, with shares slumping in pre-market after the shipping giant withdrew full-year guidance and said it had been forced to implement cost-cutting initiatives in order to combat soft global shipment volumes amid "significantly" worsening macroeconomic trends.
AvaTrade's Naeem Aslam said: "US and European markets are trading lower as traders are paying attention to warning signs issued by the big companies. The fact that FedEx expects the US economy to enter into a recession has made traders trade carefully, and there aren't many who are willing to buy the market.
"It is highly likely that we will see a similar message from other companies in the coming days as well, and that may make the overall sentiment even more adverse. The fact is that more and more CEO are feeling pessimistic about the global economy, and this may not be the best environment for global markets to do well."
On the macro front, a preliminary reading of the University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index will be published at 1500 BST.
No major earnings were slated for release on Friday.
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com