Morning Note

“US Futures Lower amid Trade War Fears”

--Investing.com

Seeing several similar headlines this morning. Apparently the President mouthed a sentence yesterday that featured the words China and tariffs.

Of course stocks selling off couldn’t have anything to do with 30 million American’s having filed for unemployment amid the start of the worst recession since the Great Depression, could it?

While of course, for markets, that’s an untimely utterance on Trump’s part -- and I have pondered herein the added headwind of certain fractured global relationships coming out of this -- this from Bloomberg more aptly describes what will continue to be troubling markets in the months to come:

“Futures Drop After Tech Earnings”
"U.S. equity futures drop as investors begin May pondering dreary corporate news and the persistent economic turmoil caused by the coronavirus."

Per the above, US equity futures are pointing to a sharp selloff at the open. Asian markets, the ones that weren’t on holiday, got battered overnight. Europe’s pretty much on holiday. The dollar is literally all over the place this morning; down big against the yen (the yen is a safe-have currency), up bigger against the Aussie (the Australian dollar reflects Asian conditions). It’s down vs the Euro, up vs the Pound. The 10-yr treasury is trading higher (yield lower). Commodity futures are mixed; oil up, nat gas down, gold down, silver up (spot price down a bit), copper getting hammered (of course).