London's leading shares are set to take a small step back after some discouraging trade data from China.
China's trade surplus for November was smaller than expected, as a result of exports that were lower than expected and a less severe decline in imports than economists had been expecting.
Spread betting quotes suggest the FTSE 100 will kick off a couple of points below last night's close of 6,224.
The performance of Asian markets this morning offered little encouragement, with the Nikkei 225 in Japan down 1% at 19,493 and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong 1.8% weaker at 21,814.
Overnight, US markets were led sharply lower by slumping energy stocks. The Dow Jones closed at 17,731, down 117 points, or 0.7%. The S&P 500 finished at 2,077, down 15 points (-0.7%) and the Nasdaq Composite fell 40 points to 5,102 (-0.8%).
“Once again today, we do have some notable data coming from the US but as is likely to be the case for most of this week, I expect investors to have one eye on next week’s Federal Reserve meeting and therefore position themselves accordingly,” suggested Craig Erlam at OANDA.
“This morning we’ve got manufacturing and industrial production figures from the UK, which are expected to highlight the ongoing challenges facing the sector. Fortunately, manufacturing does only account for around 9% of UK GDP and so it shouldn’t weigh too heavily on overall economic activity. That said, the Bank of England is clearly concerned about the impact the strong pound is having, hence its decision to hold off on raising interest rates and send a quite doveish message to the markets despite the economy as a whole performing rather well,” he added.
On the corporate front, heavy hitters are notable by their absence on the results schedule but with Christmas coming there may be a timely reminder from trains set and Scalextric maker Hornby (LON:HRN) that things have moved on in the Yuletide toy scene.