Before the bell: oil drops 4.5% on Iran peace hopes and futures bounce after Friday's 1.8% S&P 500 rout
December WTI is near $99 and Nasdaq 100 futures are up 0.9% before ISM manufacturing at 10 a.m. ET, with the midterms Tuesday and the October jobs report Friday.
Stocks are set to open with a bounce after Friday's selloff, and the main help is cheaper oil. OilPrice.com reports crude slipped at the start of the week on renewed hope for a U.S.-Iran deal after weekend reports of mediation talks between Iran and Qatar. It also quotes Iran's foreign minister saying Tehran is ready for "both defence and diplomacy," and ING strategists noting that the market is still bracing for more hostilities. This is hope, not a deal.
Where futures trade versus Friday
| Contract (December) | About 6:20 AM ET | Friday close | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| S&P 500 (ES) | 7,654.25 | 7,614.00 | +0.53% |
| Nasdaq 100 (NQ) | 28,778.00 | 28,534.00 | +0.86% |
| Dow (YM) | 52,230 | 51,918 | +0.60% |
| Gold (GC) | $3,911.50 | $3,898.90 | +0.32% |
| WTI crude (CL, front month) | $99.38 | $104.12 | -4.55% |
Front-month futures from Yahoo Finance; percentages are our arithmetic. Premarket volume is thin, and the Friday figure is the last daily value in that feed.
S&P 500 December futures are still about 2.8% below their Oct. 6 peak in our chart, so this is a bounce inside a pullback, not a recovery.
What Friday did
By Yahoo Finance's daily closes, the S&P 500 fell 1.8% on Friday to 7,580.07, the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.9% to 25,437.00 and the Dow fell 1.1% to 51,770.31. The tech rout is covered in our reports on Intel and Alphabet, and last night's Nightcap has the Sunday-evening reopening.
Oil: relief, with a high floor
December WTI is near $99 after closing Friday at $104.12. Brent was near $110 in OilPrice.com's morning snapshot. Goldman Sachs raised its December Brent forecast to $105 from $90 and WTI to $94, and its 2027 averages to $88 for Brent and $78 for WTI, CNBC reports, citing disruption risk from the Middle East and Russia-Ukraine conflicts. So a fall of this size still leaves crude far above where that forecast puts it.
Airlines show where it hurts. CNBC reports that Ryanair's first-half profit fell 15% to 2.15 billion euros ($2.3 billion) as its unhedged fuel, about 20% of its needs, doubled in price. CEO Michael O'Leary said he expects European fares to rise 10% and perhaps 20% in 2027 as hedges roll off, and the airline is starting a cost review that includes a possible temporary pay freeze.
Rates and crypto
The Treasury's curve shows the 10-year yield at 4.94% on Friday, down from 4.98% Thursday, with the 2-year at 4.56% and the 30-year at 5.31%; see the Treasury's data. The 30-year mortgage rate on our board is 7.24%. Bitcoin is $77,746 and Ether $2,282 on Coinbase at 6:31 AM ET, down 0.1% and up 0.7% over 24 hours.
Today and this week
ISM manufacturing for October is the main release today; our calendar shows a forecast of 54.6 against 54.5 prior. Then:
- Tuesday: JOLTS job openings (forecast 7.125 million; prior 7.079 million). Election Day for the midterms.
- Wednesday: ADP employment (forecast 65,000; prior 90,000) and the ISM services index (forecast 54.8; prior 54.9).
- Thursday: jobless claims (forecast 195,000; prior 194,000).
- Friday: October payrolls (forecast 65,000; prior 29,000) and unemployment at 4.2%.
Inflation is still the backdrop: our GDP and PCE report has the latest readings, and the next CPI is Nov. 10.
Sources: Yahoo Finance; OilPrice.com; CNBC; U.S. Treasury; Coinbase; Chronicle markets board and calendar. This is market information, not investment advice.
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