Dow Futures Down 135
Dow futures are down 136 points.
S&P 500 futures are down 15 points.
Nasdaq futures are down 29 points.
There has been a decent amount of bad news since Wednesday's U.S. markets closed. Fresh data out of France and Italy have economists concerned that those economies could be in the midst of contraction.
Meanwhile, Chinese exports grew less than expected and Japanese machine tools orders totally collapsed.
Later today, we'll get the latest tally of U.S. weekly initial jobless claims. Economists estimate claims came in at 315,000, which would be the same level as last week's 315,000 print.
"Initial jobless claims continue to linger below 320k," said Nomura economists. "This suggests that layoffs have bottomed out and also corroborates the strong payroll growth and declines in the unemployment rate we?ve seen this year."
On Wednesday, the S&P 500 closed at 1,972, which isn't too far from its all-time high of 1,985.