OREANDA-NEWS. November 22, 2011. US stocks closed down with Oil & Gas and Utilities as the laggards on Merkel tough stance towards monetary easing. S&P 500 index declined 0.41%, Russell 2000 Index was down by 0.8%. VIX inched up by 2.86% to 31.97. The US GDP growth was revised down to 2.0% from 2.5% due to falling inventories. Personal consumption rose by 2.3%.

Richmond Fed manufacturing Index was 0 vs consensus forecast of -2.

Asian indices were down on Wednesday as HSBC PMI Manufacturing Index declined to 48 in November, indicating that the Chinese economy may experience “hard landing”. S&P/ASX 200 declined 1.98%. Korean Kospi was down by 2.36%, Hang Seng  lost 1.93%. Japanese Nikkei lost 0.4%. Shanghai stock indices declined 0.5% on average at 6:00 GMT.

PMI data for the Eurozone, Durable goods orders, Personal income/spending and the University of Michigan Consumer Confidence data will be In focus in the US today.

1 S&P 500 company and 4 Bloomberg Europe Index companies are to present quarterly earnings reports.