Leading U.S. stock exchanges said late Sunday that they will close for both floor and electronic trading Monday and possibly beyond, as a safety measure because of Hurricane Sandy, a monster storm expected to hit New York City early in the week. “We support the consensus of the markets and the regulatory community that the dangerous conditions developing as a result of Hurricane Sandy will make it extremely difficult to ensure the safety of our people and communities, and safety must be our first priority," NYSE Euronext said in a statement on its website. The Nasdaq OMX Group Inc. and BATS also announced that stock and option trading would be closed Monday, and that the trading schedule for Tuesday would be confirmed later. The stock exchanges had said earlier that they would close floor trading, but that electronic trading Monday would continue uninterrupted. A statement by the CME Group, meanwhile, said the derivatives exchange will be closing its U.S. equity-index futures and options markets Monday on its trading floor and on the CME Globex trading platform, “in coordination with the U.S. equities markets." Trading in those markets, which began at 6 p.m. Eastern Time on Sunday, will continue until 9:15 a.m. Monday before closing, the company said in a statement on its website. “All other CME Group futures and options on futures markets will remain open," it said. The CME had already said floor trade at its New York Mercantile Exchange will be closed Monday, with the Nymex market site located in an evacuation area. The company said it will continue to update as additional information becomes available, according to a statement on its website. Hurricane Sandy was expected to come ashore near New York on Monday or Tuesday and meld with two cold fronts to produce a storm with high winds, heavy rain, flooding and snow that could extend 800 miles inland. Some observers have described it as potentially the largest storm, in terms of area covered, in U.S. history. On Sunday, New York state and city officials ordered the public transit system that serves 15 million metro-area residents. to shut down Sunday night, ordered public schools closed and ordered the evacuations of some 375,000 residents of low-lying areas in danger of flooding and storm surges. The closures came as investors were preparing to assess corporate earnings reports Monday and throughout the week, and awaiting October employment data due out Friday. The Labor Department's employment report for October is due Friday. Ahead of that, investors will get monthly figures on manufacturing, consumer spending and income as well as U.S. auto sales. Read: ‘Frankenstorm' has financial centers on edge. More quarterly financial results will roll out as well, with reports from auto makers Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Inc. due Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively. Results from MasterCard Inc. and Visa Inc. on Wednesday should provide insight into the mind-set of consumers, and oil heavyweight Chevron Corp. will report Friday. More than half of S&P 500 companies have posted results. “Corporate data this quarter has been so bad and the guidance was really negative," said James Dailey, portfolio manager at the TEAM Asset Strategy Fund. “The combination of the market rolling over after the [Federal Reserve's quantitative-easing] announcement and corporate data is starting to strike" at investor confidence, he said. Also set to arrive in the coming week are results from insurer MetLife Inc. , drug maker Pfizer Inc. and coffee retailer Starbucks Corp . The stock market on Wednesday will close the books on October, ending a rough month for U.S. equities, which have been hit after a number of industry heavyweights have posted disappointing results, including Apple Inc. , General Electric Co. , Google Inc. and McDonald's Corp. . On the economic front, the Labor Department on Friday is expected to report an increase of 120,000 in nonfarm payrolls in October, and an uptick in the unemployment rate to 7.9% from 7.8%. Ahead of that, more information about the U.S. labor picture will come from ADP's October report on private-sector jobs and from the government's tally of weekly jobless claims, each due Thursday. The big risk facing stocks on Friday is if the government's jobs report “is much worse than expected," said Dailey. “Markets are in a field position where bad news is being punished mercilessly, and what we haven't had yet is significantly bad news on the macroeconomic front in U.S. data." Poor data are “being greeted as bad news now," a shift in the market since the Fed announced its third round of quantitative easing aimed at stimulating the economy, he said. The ISM manufacturing index for October is also due next week. Lackluster corporate results have helped to push major stock indexes toward their first monthly losses in five months. Tech stocks as measured by the Nasdaq Composite have been hit hard as they've lost 4.1% in October. The Dow Jones Industrial Average has declined 2.5% and the S&P 500 has pulled back 2%. Read: U.S. stocks finish with weekly losses. “For international companies that are selling into weaker markets, you're seeing a slowdown in revenue growth," said Jeff Auxier of the Auxier Focus Fund, who said he prefers holdings in companies that offer “lower-ticket" items like basic necessities. Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S on Friday said 54% of S&P 500 companies have reported third-quarter results, and 63.1% have posted revenue below analyst expectations. In a typical quarter since 2002, 38% of companies have missed Wall Street's estimates. Also, of the 272 companies in the broad-based index that have reported, earnings for 62.5% have been above expectations and 25.4% have been lower-than-anticipated. In a typical quarter since 1994, 62% of companies beat estimates and 21% missed estimates. Auxier noted as companies continue to struggle with slowing top-line growth, a number of them have turned to layoffs to reduce costs. This week, U.S. corporate layoffs neared 18,000. Read about layoffs by U.S. companies in The Tell blog. Marketwatch
