US Pre Market Update: Struggle to sustain Wall Street rebound

Wall Street managed to stage something of a recovery during Thursday's session, pulling back impressively from the test of recent lows, but despite Asian markets also making progress, index futures suggest that the week could yet end on something of a downbeat note. We do however have non-farm payrolls plus the accompanying wage data due for release ahead of the opening bell and the detail here could yet provide some meaningful direction for stocks. Critically the market will be looking for any clues that the Federal Reserve can accelerate any pause in the series of rate hikes we've been seeing of late.

Trade tensions continue to cast something of a shadow over sentiment so with that in mind, Chinese import and export data that is due for publication over the weekend break is likely to find itself under scrutiny. No significant deviation from expectations here will certainly soften criticism that Trump's tariffs alone are impacting the Chinese economy, although bigger issues – such as the divergence of opinion over last week's G20 summit and the US issued extradition warrant for Huawei's CFO – continue to linger. Wall Street seems to be sliding lower and tensions like these will only accelerate any selling pressures.

Ahead of the open we're calling the DOW down 153 at 24,795 and the S&P down 16 at 2680.