U.S. Stocks Open Lower Ahead of Big Tech Earnings Reports

U.S. stocks opened lower and oil prices rebounded as investors worried about slowing global growth and looked ahead to earnings from Microsoft and Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL).

At 9:45 AM ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 280 points or 0.8%, while the S&P 500 fell 0.9% and the NASDAQ Composite fell 1.5%.

Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) stock fell 1.7% in early trading a day after the social media company accepted Elon Musk’s $44 billion take-private offer, though analysts and investors were still trying to work out the longer-term implications of his ownership on the platform.

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Alphabet Inc Class C (NASDAQ:GOOG), which report after the closing bell tonight, kick off a week of big tech earnings, with Twitter coming later as well as Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:FB), Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN).

One-third of the S&P 500 stocks will report results this week.

In economic news, durable goods orders rose 0.8% last month, falling slightly below the expectation for 1% growth but a rebound from February’s decline of 1.7%.

Oil also staged a comeback after slumping on Monday. An outbreak of Covid-19 in China’s capital of Beijing spooked traders yesterday on fears of more lockdowns. Those fears remain, but oil rose on Tuesday, with Crude Oil WTI Futures up 1.3% to $99.86, and Brent Oil Futures crude up 1.6% to $103.84. Gold Futures rose 1.8% to $1911/oz.