REUTERS/Tony Gentile
Pope Francis laughs with a baby during a special audience with parish cells for the evangelization in Paul VI hall at the Vatican September 5, 2015.
Markets in the US are closed for Labour Day. Everyone is in Maine eating lobster. The next two market holidays in the US are Thanksgiving and Christmas Day.
Asian markets are stable after China's national holiday. At the break the benchmark Shanghai Composite index currently sits at 3187.8, an increase of 0.88%.
Germany's industrial production figures are mixed. Europe's biggest economy published its production figures at 7 a.m. (2 a.m. ET). Month on month production grew 0.7%, short of analysts' estimates of a 1% increase, but year on year figures came in higher than expected at 0.5%.
China on lowered its 2014 GDP growth figure. Official data show China's economy grew 0.1% slower than thought last year, which official data revised to 7.3% growth, from 7.4%, as concerns mount over slowing growth in the world's second-largest economy.
German companies make economic case for accepting refugees. Europe's top economy expects to receive 800,000 asylum seekers this year, which the powerful BDI federation wants to integrate into the jobs market. "We'll be helping the refugees but also ourselves as well," BDI Chief Ulrich Grillo said.
Investor confidence data for the EU is published today. The Sentix investor confidence indicator is a survey of 1600 analysts and investors on how they think the markets and economy will perform in the future. The consensus is that this will fall to around 14 points, from 16.
Japan's Toshiba to book a loss in the wake of its accounting scandal. The 140-year old conglomerate said that its annual loss for the year to March 2015 would be 37.8 billion yen ($318 million), reversing a previously expected 120 billion yen annual profit.
International Monetary Fund praises Ukraine debt restructuring. In a visit to Kiev, IMF chief Christine Lagarde praised a deal to restructure the country's debt burden. "I'm extremely encouraged by the progress that you have been achieving (over) the past few months," Lagarde said at a press conference alongside Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
The price of oil is still falling. U.S. crude for October delivery , also known as West Texas Intermediate, was down 22 cents at $45.83, after settling 70 cents down, or 1.5 percent, overnight.
Turkish soldiers killed in PKK attack. Several Turkish soldiers were killed and others wounded on Sunday in a major attack in southeastern Hakkari province carried out by Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants, official media said.