Stock Futures Suggest Lower Opening

After five days of gains, the stock market is looking at a lower open today. CNBC reports, "The major indexes indicated drops approaching 2 percent." Joseph Poon, head of Mcquarie Private Wealth Asia, referred to data from the retail industry, "The market is really spooked I'm afraid. We just have to see some stability… the US consumer is usually the guy that's going to pull us back." While sales were up on Black Friday, both in person and online, there were deep discounts that cut into profitability. The National Retail Federation said, "We take all of this into context and realize Black Friday is not going to save the holiday season. Regardless of retail sales, retail profits are another matter. Everything they sold was at a razor-thin margin." And today happens to be Cyber Monday, the unofficial start of the online holiday shopping season.