US futures dribble lower on the session

That is keeping with the more subdued risk appetite, which more or less kicked off after a set of dismal economic releases from China earlier today. That prompted serious concerns about China’s domestic demand in general, as rate cuts and liquidity injections from the PBOC are failing to bring about a change in the economic trend.

It looks like China needs more than just monetary policy to do the heavy lifting and if the loan demand conditions are any indication, it is that it won’t be long until we start to see some serious cracks show up.

Anyway, the poor data has been enough to keep markets more defensive today with the dollar and yen also gaining strongly in the major currencies space. Meanwhile, Treasury yields are lower with 10-year yields down 2 bps to 2.83% but the bond market in general is doing some tinkering on its own.

Risk appetite looks sapped with S&P 500 futures down 0.5%, even if European indices are barely hanging on in positive territory (which owes to some catching up to the surging rally in Wall Street last Friday).

The S&P 500 chart shows that there is some room to roam to the upside but said room is rather limited. The key resistance levels from the 28 April and 4 May highs just above 4,300 and the 200-day moving average at 4,328 are poised to see sellers show up: