daytrading nov 22 pre-market

Morning traders.

Market wrap:
Australian stocks are set to open at a six-week low despite a partial recovery on Wall Street that pared the benchmark index's fourth straight losing session.

The December SPI 200 futures contract ended the night session 65 points or around 1.5% weaker at 4121 as a deficit stand-off continued in Washington and a ratings agency warned France's AAA credit rating is in danger.

The Dow tumbled more than 340 points, with all 30 components losing ground, before an afternoon recovery cut its losses to 249 points or 2.11%. The benchmark S&P 500 also pared its initial fall but closed in the red for a fourth night, down 1.87%.

The declines came after a Democratic aide warned that the congressional "super-committee" assigned to cut the US budget deficit was deadlocked and unable to agree on a plan to cut at least US$1.2 trillion over 10 years. The Congressional Budget Office was this morning due to receive advance details of the plan from the committee to prepare for an announcement tomorrow night.

"A lot of the [US economic] data recently is looking better than expected - retail sales, industrial production, LEI [Leading Economic Indicators] and today home sales. But investors are saying, 'That's nice, but backwards-looking, we could be pushed back into recession by Europe'," the chief equity strategist at S&P Capital IQ told MarketWatch. "Maybe the thought is how can we be so naive to think European leaders will resolve their problems when we can't resolve our own?"

European markets wilted as Moody's said recent turmoil threatened France's triple-A credit rating and Spanish bond yields crept up despite the election of a new government. Britain's FTSE dropped 2.62%, Germany's DAX 3.35%, France's CAC 3.41% and Italy's FTSE MIB 4.74%.

Spain's IBEX 35 index fell 3.5% amid scepticism about how much difference Sunday's thumping election victory for the conservative Popular Party will make in a nation with the euro-zone's highest unemployment. The 10-year Spanish government bond yield rose 19 basis points to 6.54%, according to MarketWatch.

A flight from risk sent the US dollar index to a six-week high, the Australian dollar to a six-week low and most commodities sharply lower. The Australian dollar was recently buying 98.69 US cents, down around a cent overnight.

Copper suffered its biggest fall in around three weeks en route to a one-month low. In London, copper fell 2.9%, aluminium 1.7%, lead 3.1%, tin 4.1% and zinc 2.5%. Nickel rallied 0.8%. US copper was recently off 2.2%.

Gold fell back under US$1,700 an ounce as the greenback's advance accelerated a move out of assets and into cash. Gold for December delivery was lately off $41.40 or 2.4% at US$1,683.40 an ounce. December silver fell 77 cents or 2.4% to US$31.65 an ounce.

Oil fell as low as US$95.24 a barrel before moderating its loss to just 40 cents or 0.4% at US$97.27.

TRADING THEMES TODAY

GLIMMERS OF HOPE AMID THE GLOOM: A bleak night on overseas markets has the XJO lined up for its weakest start since October 7 and appears to dash any optimism that the horizontal support levels established over the last four weeks will hold. However, bulls may take hope from partial recoveries in US stocks and especially in oil, which continues to buck the sceptical mood elsewhere. The failure of the congressional super-committee has been anticipated by US investors since the middle of last week and now appears to be factored in, allowing room for a modest rebound when an announcement is finally made. However, Thursday's public holiday in the US complicates matters and may delay any recovery on the ASX.

ECONOMIC NEWS: No significant domestic news scheduled today. Preliminary quarterly GDP figures are tonight's main interest in the US. Also scheduled: the minutes from the last Federal Reserve meeting, Richmond manufacturing index and the GDP price index.

Good luck to all.