OREANDA-NEWS. February 1, 2012. The US indices were slightly down on Monday. S&P 500 Index lost 0.05% while Russell added 0.06% with Oil & Gas (-0.85%) as the laggards and Utilities (+0.43%) as the leaders. Gamma sellers were in favor again as investors ignored bad news from the European debt markets and ECB intervened to smash yields on Portugal notes.

S&P/Case-Shiller home prices Index was down by 0.7% vs consensus forecast of 0.5%.

Chicago Fed Manufacturing Index was down to 60.2 vs consensus forecast of 63.

CBOT Manufacturing Index was down to 61.1 vs consensus forecast of 68.

Of 199 S&P 500 Index constituents the EPS of 134 and revenues of 110 companies beat expectations so far.

Asian markets were mixed on Wednesday. Hang Seng lost 0.38%, Kospi was up by 0.18%, Japanese Nikkei added 0.08%. S&P/ASX 200 was down by 0.87%. Chinese indices lost on average 0.8%. The Manufacturing PMI was up to 50.5, indicating some upward momentum in the Chinese Manufacturing activity. However, looming easing forecasts curb markets rally.

PMI Manufacturing activity indices will be in focus in Europe today.

US ADP Payrolls ISM Manufacturing for January, Construction Orders for December will be in focus in the US today.

Earnings season will go on with 21 companies to report.