10 Things You Need To Know Before The Opening Bell

Mamta Badkar

 Jan. 18, 2013

Christopher Polk/Getty Images

Good morning. Here's what you need to know.

• Asian markets were higher in overnight trading with the Nikkei up 2.86 percent on reports that the central bank and ministry of Finance are talking about cooperating more on policy. The Shanghai Composite was up 1.41 percent. Europe is mixed and U.S. futures are flat.

• Chinese Q4 GDP beat expectations rising 7.9 percent year-over-year (YoY). Bank of America's Ting Lu wrote that policymakers are unlikely to change stimulus. Industrial production in December was up 10.3 percent YoY. This added to signs that the economy is recovering. 

• China also released its 2012 fixed asset investment (FAI) reading which eased to 20.6 percent. This is being boosted by Beijing's plans to speed up urbanization. Meanwhile, retail sales were up 15.2 percent. Electricity consumption was up 5.5 percent on the year.

• General Electric profits were up 7.5 percent beating expectations. The company reported fourth quarter earnings of $0.38 per share on revenue of $39.33 billion. This reflects CEO Jeff Immelt's focus on the energy equipment business. 

• 53 percent of Americans think the failure to extend the debt limit, and a resulting default, will leave the country facing a major economic crisis, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll. Meanwhile, Republican leaders have said the may temporarily extend the debt limit to avoid default. 

• In more earnings news, Schlumberger beat expectations when it reported Q4 earnings of $1.08 per share, on revenue of $11.17 billion. Meanwhile, Morgan Stanley is expected to report earnings of $0.29 per share.

• Consumer sentiment data for January will up at 9:55 a.m. ET. Analysts polled by Bloomberg are look for the sentiment index level to fall to 75.

• UK retail sales declined 0.1 percent month-over-month, but were up 0.3 percent on the year. This missed expectations of a 0.2 percent monthly rise, and year-over-year rise of one percent.
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• 22 foreign hostages were unaccounted for on Friday, according to Reuters. Meanwhile, their captors have threatened to attack energy installations after Algerian forces entered a desert gas plant to free hundreds of captives.
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• In a 90-minute interview with Oprah last night, Lance Armstrong's confessed that he started cheating in the mid-1990s, and took EPO - a performance enhancing drug, blood transfusions, and testosterone until 2005. He also denied former teammate Tyler Hamilton's story that he tested positive at the 2001 Tour de Suisse and covered it up.