The main US market averages are now being called to start the day in a mixed fashion, with small falls in the Dow Jones Industrials and S&P 500 but with the Nasdaq-100 up by a tad.

That ahead of the release of the Chicago NAPM´s manufacturing sector survey for the month of February and despite the 'mixed' macroeconomic figures which were released before the start of today´s session.

Shares of Groupon are cratering by 27% after the release of its latest quarterly results. JC Penney is another big loser after announcing weaker than expected same store sales numbers for the fourth quarter.

Gross domestic product expanded at an annualised rate of 0.1% in the last three months of 2012, slightly ahead of the 0.1% fall initially estimated but less than the 0.5% gain anticipated.

Initial weekly unemployment claims fell by 22,000 persons, to the 344,000 level, well below the 360,000 expected by economists.

The results of the Chicago NAPM manufacturing sector survey will be released at 14:45.

10 year US Treasury yields are now down by 2 basis points, to the 1.88% mark.

Front month West Texas crude futures are now rising by 0.1% to the $92.67/barrel mark on the NYMEX.

AB

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