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Briefing.com Summary:

*WTI crude futures hit $110.00/bbl earlier before sliding back to the $105.00 area.

*A disappointing IPO of Korean neocloud company Elice has catalyzed some renewed selling of AI stocks.

*SpaceX and Netflix are due to report their results after the close.

The writing for today's open may have been on the wall in yesterday's afternoon action, which featured a rollback of larger gains for many of the stocks caught up in the AI trade. That included CoreWeave (CRWV), which coughed up a 7.4% gain and ended the day down 0.4%. 

CoreWeave is down another 3.7% in pre-market action, falling in sympathy with the ugly IPO for Korean neocloud company Elice, which fell more than 30% on its first day of trading, and falling further on investor concerns about its AI-fueled debt burden.

That is one element weighing on the equity futures market. Other elements include a Loop Capital downgrade of Apple (AAPL) to Neutral from Buy on concerns about slower iPhone sales, volatility in oil prices (WTI hit $110.00/bbl earlier but is back down to $104.95, up 1.2%), weakness in semiconductor stocks, and a 6.0% decline in General Motors (GM), which narrowed its FY26 EPS outlook from $12.00-14.00 to $12.75-13.75, the midpoint of which is below the current consensus estimate.

There wasn't good news on the housing front either.

Total housing starts were down 5.2% month-over-month in September to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.221 million (Briefing.com consensus: 1.305 million) following an upwardly revised 1.288 million (from 1.275 million) in August. Building permits were down 0.2% month-over-month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.400 million (Briefing.com consensus: 1.390 million).

The key takeaway from the report is that there was no growth in permits for single-unit dwellings in any region. Building permits are a leading indicator, and the lack of growth is a reflection of the constraints builders and homebuyers alike face from higher financing costs.

There is a modicum of relief on the interest rate front this morning. The 10-yr note yield is down three basis points to 5.11%, yet that improvement isn't the uplifting kind of improvement. It is being driven by slowdown worries and safe-haven trading activity.

Those thoughts are mirrored in an equity futures market that, for the time being, has lost some moxie. The S&P 500 futures are down 10 points and are trading 0.1% below fair value, the Nasdaq 100 futures are down 126 points and are trading 0.5% below fair value, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average futures are down 12 points and are trading fractionally below fair value.

The relative strength of the Dow futures is more defensive posturing than anything else, as it is being aided by a rotation away from higher-beta stocks. To be fair, 3M (MMM) is helping a bit after its earnings report and news of an expanded commercial relationship with an Amazon (AMZN) subsidiary.

3M's earnings report was a highlight before today's open, along with results from Northrop Grumman (NOC), RTX Corp. (RTX), Halliburton (HAL), and Habro (HAS), to name a few others. SpaceX (SPCX), Netfilx (NFLX), United Airlines (UAL), and Capital One (COF) are the headliners reporting results after the close.

--Patrick J. O'Hare, Briefing.com