US pre-open: Stocks seen slightly lower on North Korea concerns

US futures pointed to a downbeat open on Wall Street on Friday after North Korea threatened to test a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific.

At 1110 BST, Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 futures were down 0.1%, while Nasdaq futures were off 0.2%.

Speaking at a United Nations meeting in New York late on Thursday, North Korea's foreign minister Ri Yong Ho said the country could consider a nuclear test of "unprecedented scale".

Meanwhile, in a statement reported by North Korea's official news agency, Kim Jong Un said US President Donald Trump is "deranged" and will "pay dearly" for his threats. He added that his country would consider "the hardest level of hardline countermeasure in history" against the US.

His comments came after Trump delivered a speech at the United Nations earlier in the week in which he pledged to destroy North Korea if the US was attacked.

IG market analyst Joshua Mahony said: "Global risk sentiment within the markets has taken a hit this morning, as the US-North Korean standoff has ratcheted up once more. Coming off the back of Donald Trump’s threat that the US could totally destroy North Korea, they have finally responded in kind, with their foreign minister stating that the leader could detonate a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific.

"Unsurprisingly we have seen the value of gold and the yen gain ground, with overnight losses in Asian equities leading to a similarly downbeat tone in Europe in the early hours of trade."

Investors will eye speeches from three Fed officials. San Francisco Fed President John Williams is due to speak at the Swiss National Bank Research Conference in Zurich, while Kansas City President Esther George will deliver a keynote speech at an oil conference in Oklahoma and Dallas Fed chief Robert Kaplan will take part in a Q&A at the same conference.

On the corporate front, shares in biopharmaceutical group Versartis tumbled in pre-market trade after it said late on Thursday that its drug somavaratan did not meet its primary endpoint in a phase 3 trial.

Elsewhere, Apple shares slipped as the technology giant launched its iPhone 8.

On the macroeconomic calendar, Markit's manufacturing, services and composite PMIs are due at 1445 BST.