US equity markets retreated ahead of a week full of high-profile risk events, including key central bank interest rate decisions and economic data, and major US corporate earnings releases - Dow fell -261-points or -0.77%. The broader S&P500 dropped -1.30%, with Energy (down -2.29%), Information Technology (-1.94%), Communication Services (-1.80%) and Consumer Discretionary (-1.71%) all falling over >1.5% to lead ten of the eleven primary sectors lower. Consumer Staples (up +0.07%) was the only primary sector to advance. Johnson & Johnson (J&J) fell -3.70% after The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that a federal appeals court rejected the consumer products and pharmaceutical company’s move to place its liabilities for tens of thousands of claims linking talc-based products to cancer into bankruptcy. The WSJ report said the talc bankruptcy case was dismissed, because the appeals court said J&J’s talc unit, LTL Management LLC, wasn’t in financial distress. J&J faced about 38,000 lawsuits, over links to the company’s Baby Powder to ovarian cancer, asbestos poisoning and other illnesses. The Nasdaq shed -1.96%. Three of the four largest U.S. companies by market value - Alphabet Inc (down -2.45%), Amazon.com Inc (-1.65%) and Apple Inc (-2.01%) - all fell ahead of release of their latest quarterly results after the market close on Thursday night AEST (2 February). The small capitalisation Russell 2000 lost -1.35%.
