10 things you need to know before European markets open
The Fed is coming. The Federal Reserve is expected on Wednesday to point to a growing US economy and stronger job market as it sets the stage for a possible interest rate hike in September. The U.S. central bank is scheduled to issue its latest policy statement at 2 p.m. New York time (7 p.m. London time) following a two-day meeting, spelling out how policymakers feel the economy has progressed since they last met in June.
Belgium's Solvay is making a massive push for US chemicals firm Cytec. Belgian chemical group Solvay will buy peer Cytec in a deal valuing the US firm and its debt at $6.4 billion (£4.10 billion), the company said on Wednesday. Solvay said in a statement it would pay $75.25 (£48.21) per share for Cytec, which closed at $58.39 (£37.41) on Tuesday.
Yemen's ceasefire has fallen apart. A humanitarian truce in Yemen has failed to take hold after Saudi-led warplanes resumed raids on rebels who clashed with loyalists, military sources said. Iran, which backs the Shiite Huthi rebels, accused its Sunni regional rival Riyadh of "playing with fire and with the ceasefire"
Amazon wants air space for delivery drones. Amazon Prime Air project vice president Gur Kimchi used a NASA convention in California on Tuesday to fly the idea of dedicating separate air zones for commercial drones.
Twitter says it doesn't expect any user growth for a long time. During the company's Q2 earnings call on Tuesday, Twitter Finance Chief Anthony Noto basically said that the company's user growth is not expected to rebound anytime soon. "We do not expect to see sustained meaningful growth in MAU until we start to reach the mass market. We expect that will take a considerable amount of time."
And Twitter shares fell by as much as 12% after the close. Shares of Twitter, which had popped as much as 6% after the earnings beat, quickly reversed course during the conference call and were trading down more than 12% after the earnings call ended.
UK lending figures are coming. At 9:30 a.m. London time (4:30 a.m. New York time), we'll get June figures for consumer lending in the UK - analysts are expecting mortgage applications to have ticked upwards to 66,000.
Yelp crashed. Business ratings and reviews firm Yelp's shares fell as much as 16% in after-hours trading on Tuesday after the company slashed its outlook for full-year earnings.
Brazil's state-run utility is being pulled into the Petrobras scandal. Brazilian police on Tuesday arrested two executives involved in building a nuclear power plant for Eletrobras, pulling the state-run utility into a corruption scandal that has engulfed government-owned oil company Petrobras.
Asian markets are down. As of 6:45 a.m. London time (1:15 a.m. New York) the Shanghai composite is down 0.82%, the Hang Seng is down 0.8% and Japan's Nikkei is down 0.17%.