US open: Stocks take breather ahead of busy week

US stocks are taking a breather after a barrage of quarterly earnings from various technology heavyweights propelled the S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 to fresh record closes on Friday.

Investors were also eyeing an interest rate decision from the Federal Reserve on Wednesday and the release of the monthly non-farm payrolls report at the end of the week. The announcement of the White House's pick to take the reins at the Federal Reserve was also expected, on Thursday.

Ahead of those developments, as of 1637 BST the Dow Jones Industrial Average was off by 0.34% or 78.89 points at 23,355.30, with the S&P 500 retreating by 0.37% or 9.43 points alongside while the Nasdaq Composite was giving back a fraction of the prior session's gains, slipping 0.16% to 6,690.28.

That was alongside a three basis point fall in the yield on the benchmark 10-year US Treasury note to 2.37%.

Oanda analyst Craig Erlam said: "With the Federal Reserve, Bank of Japan and Bank of England all holding monetary policy meetings this week, there'll undoubtedly be a strong focus on central banks. When it comes to the Fed though, it may not be the interest rate decision itself that attracts the most attention, rather President Donald Trump’s announcement on who will succeed Janet Yellen as Chair from February, with the incumbent still in the race."

In corporate news, shares of homebuilder CalAtlantic rocketed after agreeing a merger with fellow peer Lennar Corp, in a deal worth around $9.3bn.

Elsewhere, Wal-Mart was a touch lower in pre-market trade as it said that the chief of its UK Asda chain, Sean Clarke, would be stepping down at the end of the year and was to be succeeded by Roger Burnley.

Also on the M&A front, on Monday it emerged that Dynegy would merge with Vista Energy, while Axalta Coating Systems was likely to be in focus after Dutch Dulux maker Akzo Nobel confirmed that the two were in discussions about a merger.

From a sector standpoint, the weakest areas of the market were: Drug Retailers (-4.88%), Travel and Tourism (-4.43%) and ires (-4.42%).

As far as fresh economic data was concerned, the Commerce Department reported that personal consumption expenditures rose by 1.0% month-on-month in September (consensus: 0.8%), while income growth met forecasts with growth of 0.4%.

To take note of, a key gauge of price pressures contained in that same report, the PCE price deflator, rose to a 1.6% clip in year-on-year terms, falling slightly short of the 1.7% rise economists had anticipated.

Significantly, Monday's personal income and spending report also revealed a sharp drop in the savings rate from August's level of 3.6% to 3.1%.