U.S. futures fall as investors eye Italy; Dow Jones down 0.42%

Investing.com - U.S. stock futures edged lower on Monday, as investors grew wary ahead of a key Italian parliamentary vote amid concerns over the country's deepening sovereign debt.

Ahead of the open, the Dow Jones Industrial Average futures pointed to a drop of 0.42%, S&P 500 futures signaled a 0.56% decline, while the Nasdaq 100 futures indicated a 0.41% fall.

The yield on Italian 10-year government bonds soared to a euro-lifetime high, amid open dissent within Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government ahead of a parliamentary vote on public finances on Tuesday.

On Sunday, Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou announced that he would step down to allow the creation of a national unity government intended to secure international financing and avert a potential default.

The financial sector led losses, as U.S. lenders tracked their European counterparts. Shares in Bank of America plummeted 6.08% and Goldman Sachs tumbled 2.45%, while Citigroup and JP Morgan declined 1.43% and 1.19%.

Cyclical stocks were also hit, as chip maker Intel Corp dropped 1.54%, while software giants Oracle and Cisco Systems saw shares decline 1.90% and 0.83% respectively.

In company news, General Motors was down 1.75% although it seemed to be on track to double its annual tally to 5 million vehicles in China by 2015 despite slowing growth in the world's largest auto market.

Elsewhere, Warner Chilcott saw shares plunge 7.40%, after reporting on Friday total third-quarter revenue of USD655 million, a 7% decrease compared to the previous year.

On the upside, shares in retailer Best Buy rose 1.11% as it prepared to pay USD1.3 billion to buy its British partner Carphone Warehouse Group out of a fast-growing U.S. mobile phone venture, while abandoning plans for a chain of European megastores.

Meanwhile, CME Group shares advanced 1.04% and Intercontinental Exchange declined 0.25% as they moved over the weekend to limit the fallout from the MF Global Holdings bankruptcy on futures markets by lowering margin requirements on some accounts.

Across the Atlantic, European stock markets were lower. The EURO STOXX 50 fell 0.61%, France’s CAC 40 eased up 0.52%, Germany's DAX advanced 0.34%, while Britain's FTSE 100 posted a 0.69% decline.

During the Asian trading session, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index slumped 0.6%, while Japan’s Nikkei 225 Index dipped 0.31%.