Futures for equities in Canada’s largest market pointed to a lower open on Tuesday as traders returning from a long weekend fretted over weaker oil prices and the recent slump in tech stocks on Wall Street.
The TSX tumbled 230.88 points, or 1.4%, to conclude Friday and the week at 16,218.01, a drop on the week of 487 points, or 2.9%.
The Canadian dollar dropped 0.42 cents Tuesday to 75.94 cents U.S.
September futures inched down 0.03% Tuesday.
Aurora Cannabis on Tuesday appointed insider Miguel Martin as its chief executive officer and said it would record up to $1.8 billion, in impairment charges in the fourth quarter.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange gained 3.34 points Friday to 733.69. The loss on the week, though, was 11.6 points, or 1.56%.
ON WALLSTREET
Futures on the tech-heavy NASDAQ were set to fall sharply early Tuesday after technology shares suffered their worst selloff in more than five months last week.
Futures for Dow Jones Industrials sank 136 points, or 0.5%, early Tuesday, to 27,938.
Futures for the S&P 500 ditched 35.75 points, or 1.1%, at 3,3,81.75.
Futures for the NASDAQ Composite plummeted 333.25 points, or 2.9%, to 11,215.50.
Tesla plunged 10% after the S&P Dow Jones Indices failed to add the surging and speculative stock to the S&P 500 after the bell Friday.
Investors were betting on inclusion of the stock into the S&P 500, hoping for the stamp of approval on the rally by S&P. The snub shows the risks to the overheating NASDAQ trade.
Other hot NASDAQ stocks were hit hard in early trading. Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, and Google-parent Alphabet were all down 3% in pre-market trading Tuesday. Apple dropped more than 4%. Nvidia was off 5%. Microsoft and Zoom Video also fell by 3%.
Shares of Softbank dropped 7% on Monday in Japan as it was identified as the big options buyer making a bet in the billions on tech stocks continuing to surge. The tech trade could lose some of its firepower if Softbank were to curb those bets.
There was a clear rotation out of the hot tech stocks and into stocks that would benefit from the economy reopening from the coronavirus. Shares of Disney, UPS and Ford were higher in pre-market trading.
Drugmaker CEOs pledged to make safety the main priority in developing a coronavirus vaccine.
Geopolitical developments could also weigh on investor sentiment. China accused the U.S. of “bullying” as it launched a global data security initiative on Tuesday.
That came as Washington continues to pressure China’s largest tech firms and convince countries around the world to block them. President Donald Trump also recently entertained the idea of “decoupling” from China, or refusing to do business with the country.
Overseas, in Japan, the Nikkei 225 added 0.8% Tuesday, while in Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index eked up 0.1%.
Oil prices dumped $2.40 to $37.37 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices fell $10.50 to $1,923.80.
