(Reuters) – U.S. stock index futures were slightly lower on Tuesday as investors stayed away from risky assets after China deployed retaliatory tariffs against the world’s biggest economy.
Minutes after President Donald Trump’s 10% tariff on China kicked in at 12:01 a.m. ET (0501 GMT), the Asian country’s finance ministry announced tariffs on some U.S. imports.
Trump had also levied a 25% tariff on goods from Mexico and Canada over the weekend, but agreed to a 30-day pause on Monday in return for concessions on border and crime from both nations.
The last minute change helped the three major U.S. stock indexes pare some of the heavy losses notched earlier on Monday and close trading well off the session’s lows.
“The events of the last few days have once again shown that anything can be expected of Trump,” Commerzbank economists said in a note.
“There is still a high risk that significant tariffs and disruptions in international trade will ultimately occur.”
The S&P 500 had come as close as eight points away from all-time highs on Friday before selling off as the tariffs commentary rattled global markets.
Three Fed officials warned on Monday trade tariffs come with inflation risks, with one arguing that uncertainty over the outlook for prices calls for slower interest-rate cuts than otherwise.
Traders are pricing in no interest-rate action from the Federal Reserve before June, as per the CME’s FedWatch Tool.
Comments from three Fed leaders including Atlanta’s Raphael Bostic are expected throughout the day.
On the data front, a December job openings reading is due before the bell on Tuesday, with the all-important January nonfarm payrolls report slated for Friday.
At 05:08 a.m. ET, Dow E-minis were down 126 points, or 0.28%, S&P 500 E-minis were down 14.5 points, or 0.24%, and Nasdaq 100 E-minis were down 31.25 points, or 0.15%.
The quarterly earnings season raged on, with payments platform PayPal, snack maker PepsiCo and drugmaker Pfizer among the prominent companies reporting before markets open.
Google-parent Alphabet, gaming firm Electronic Arts and chipmaker AMD are reporting after markets close on Tuesday.
Among premarket movers, biotechnology firm Illumina dropped 4.7%, while PVH Corp, the holding company for brands including Calvin Klein, fell 4% after China put the firms on its “unreliable entity list”.
Palantir jumped 18.4% after the data analytics company forecast first-quarter and annual revenue above Wall Street estimates.
(Reporting by Shashwat Chauhan in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath)
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