U.S. Stock-index Futures Suggest Solidly Lower Open

About 11 hours ahead of the start of U.S. stock trade in New York, share-index futures were implying a significantly weaker open for the Monday session. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average implied a 0.7% drop when trading begins, while futures for the S&P 500 tipped a 0.6% loss, and those for the Nasdaq 100 pointed to a 0.5% drop. The futures could still make large moves from their current levels, especially after the European markets open, but if the losses hold then U.S. shares would extend their retreat from a mostly down session Friday, when the Dow industrials ended 0.8% weaker, while the S&P 500 fell 0.5%, but the Nasdaq Composite edged up 0.2%. News that Greek opposition party Syriza had won a general election there, raising the possibilty that Greece could lose its international assistance or even leave the eurozone, appeared to weigh on the U.S. futures. Uncertainty arising for the Greek results dragged some major Asian indexes lower, with Japan's Nikkei Average down 0.6% at the start of afternoon trade, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index inched 0.1% lower.