Investors waited warily for more grim news Friday about job losses, sending stock market futures lower in anticipation that the Labor Department will report that unemployment has climbed to 6.8 percent from October to November.
The percentage figures translate to companies cutting another 320,000 people from the payrolls, the biggest drop in month-to-month job losses since October 2001, a month after 9/11.
Americans lost 1.2 million jobs through October — with the unemployment rate at 6.5 percent — and AT&T announced Thursday that it planned to chop another 12,000 jobs.
It therefore came as little surprise that the expected report affected the likely Wall Street opening. Futures fell following a day in which the Dow dropped more than 200 points.
The Dow Jones Industrial average futures declined 24, or 0.29 percent, to 8378, the Nasdaq 100 dipped 3.25, or 0.29 percent to 1131.75, and the Standard & Poors 500 index futures sank 3.90, or 0.46 percent, to 843.60.
The futures indexes followed lower market closings in Asia and Europe, though the losses were minor.
What the unemployment rate means for investors, of course, is that more job losses translate into even less consumer spending at a time when retailers already are expecting a big hole in their Christmas stockings and the Big Three auto dealers are on the brink of financial disaster.
Vehicle sales are at an annualized rate of 10.2 million, down from 17 million in 2007.
The chief executives of General Motors, Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC were to appear before the House Finance Committee Friday in their second consecutive day of appeals to Congress for $34 billion in loans. They have not been getting a warm reception on Capitol Hill.
On another economic front, the Federal Reserve is expected to release consumer credit data for October.
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