US MARKETS:

S&P 500 futures down 0.2% to 2,923.25
Brent futures up 0.2% to $60.44/bbl
Gold spot down 0.2% to $1,499.52
US Dollar Index little changed at 98.24

GLOBAL NEWS:

Earnings season: Gap, Intuit, Salesforce, and VMware are among companies reporting earnings today.

BNP Paribas cuts its workforce in France. The bank plans to cut 500 jobs in its investor services subsidiary BP2S over three years, which represents 20% of the workforce, according to newspaper "Le Monde".

Hong Kong: HSBC and Standard Chartered call for appeasement. The two British banks have published ad pages in local newspapers calling for a peaceful resolution of the crisis in Hong Kong.

Germany: 90,000 Mastercard customers hacked. The hacked personal data of about 90,000 German Mastercard customers were published this week on an online forum, including credit card numbers. "We immediately suspended the 'Priceless Specials' (loyalty program) platform after learning of the incident," Mastercard said in a statement, adding that it would "do everything in its power to investigate and resolve problems".

Car manufacturers want stricter standards than Trump’s. Carmakers have adopted very strict emission reduction targets, despite Donald Trump cancelling the standards set up by Barack Obama. He said the manufacturers’ executives were "foolish" and now blames California, which was the source of a regulation inherited from Barack Obama's mandate.


IAG not happy with costs for third runway in Heathrow. British Airways' parent company, the IAG airline group, criticized the soaring costs for the construction of a third runway at Heathrow Airport. It issued a press release in which it said the costs will lead to a surge in airport charges charged to airlines. Heathrow plans to build a third runway from 2021 that will be operational by 2026 to accommodate 135 million passengers compared to 78 million today.