Barrons.com
Stock Futures Level After Consumer Confidence Index Underwhelms
As investors continued to digest a weaker-than-expected consumer sentiment index released in the morning, U.S. stock futures were flat in after-hours trading Tuesday evening. During the session, the S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite lost 2%, 1.6%, and 3%, respectively. Stocks had a strong first half-hour of trading Tuesday until the Conference Board released its June consumer-confidence reading at 10 a.m. The figure came in at 98.7, missing the consensus estimate of 100.0 that two dozen economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had forecast, and stocks slid for the rest of the day.
