Stock Futures Slide on Retail Earnings, Qualcomm Sell-Off

Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) are trading below fair value, with a busy day already taking off for investors. Retail stocks are weighing heavy after a slew of disappointing earnings reports, while chip stock Qualcomm (QCOM) is down 10% in electronic trading, after U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh ruled the tech firm used anticompetitive practices that "have strangled competition... and harmed rivals." The Nasdaq-100 Index (NDX) and the S&P 500 Index (SPX) are also eyeing a lower open, as U.S.-China trade tensions linger, and traders await this afternoon's Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting minutes.

Continue reading for more on today's market, including: 

• The best and worst days to buy stocks after Memorial Day, per Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Rocky White.
• 3 drug stocks seeing unusual options volume. 
• The small-cap payments stock that caught a hedge-fund boost.
• Plus, 2 retailers suffering post-earnings pullbacks, and the FAANG stock slammed by Goldman.

5 Things You Need to Know Today

1. The Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) saw 913,247 call contracts traded on Tuesday, compared to 518,154 put contracts. The single-session equity put/call ratio fell to 0.57, while the 21-day moving average stayed at 0.66.
2. Retail chain Kohl's Corporation (NYSE:KSS) is down 0.8% in electronic trading -- still reeling from Tuesday's first-quarter earnings miss, and in response to being showered in bear notes. No fewer than four analysts have slammed KSS with additional price-target cuts this morning, including Wedbush's downward revision to $58 from $65. Kohl's stock gapped to a fresh annual low yesterday, and today is on track to deepen its year-to-date loss of 16.9%.
3. Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is down 1.1% in premarket trading, after Goldman Sachs analysts estimated that a possible retaliatory ban by Beijing on Apple products could reduce the FAANG giant's earnings by 29%. The brokerage firm lowered its price target on AAPL stock to $178 from $184, implying some expected downside from Tuesday's close at $186.60.
4. Shares of Nordstrom, Inc. (NYSE:JWN) are down 10.3% in electronic trading, after the retailer last night reported a wide miss on first-quarter earnings and slashed its full-year forecast. No fewer than seven brokerage firms have already cut their price targets on JWN, which has already shed nearly 19% year-to-date.

5. Today is a busy day on the economic and earnings front, as St. Louis Fed President James Bullard and Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic will both step up to the podium. Weekly crude inventories will be out ahead of the 2 p.m. ET release of the Fed meeting minutes. Earnings reports from Advance Auto Parts (AAP), L Brands (LB), VF Corp (VFC), and Williams-Sonoma (WSM) are expected.

U.K. Markets Digest Soft Inflation Data

A continuation in trade tensions weighed on Chinese shares, though Hong Kong’s Hang Seng managed a 0.2% win. By the close, the Shanghai Composite was off 0.5%, ending near the middle of this month's tight trading range. In Japan, the Nikkei was able to close in the black, up 0.05%, while South Korea’s Kospi closed up 0.2%.

There isn’t much bullishness around European markets, either, though London’s FTSE 100 is up 0.2% on some hopes of a path forward with Brexit. Also in focus are softer-than-expected inflation numbers out of the U.K. for April. In France, the CAC 40 is off 0.3%, and Germany’s DAX has dropped 0.2%.