* Nasdaq futures lead declines
* New communications sector set to debut
Sept 24 - Welcome to the home for real-time coverage of U.S. equity markets brought to you by Reuters stocks reporters and anchored today by Terence Gabriel. Reach him on Messenger to share your thoughts on market moves: terence.gabriel.tr.com@reuters.net
FUTURES FUNK: TRADE CONCERNS WEIGH AHEAD OF OPEN (0840 AM EDT/1240 GMT)
Stocks appear set to start off the week on the wrong foot with futures sinking in premarket, led lower by Nasdaq.
The United States and China imposed fresh tariffs on each other's goods as the world's biggest economies showed no signs of backing down in their trade dispute. latest trade tensions provided another test for equity investors, which last week shrugged off concerns to send the S&P 500 .SPX and Dow industrials .DJI to record highs.
A little merger Monday fever is in the air, including Sirius XM SIRI.O and Pandora P.N , Comcast CMCSA.O and Sky SKYB.L and Michael Kors KORS.N and Versace. Meanwhile, Canada's Barrick Gold ABX.TO ABX.N to buy Rangold Resources RRS.L GOLD.O in a $18.3 billion dollar deal. newly refurbished S&P 500 communications sector .SPLRCL , which includes high profile names such as Facebook FB.O , Alphabet GOOGL.O and Netflix NFLX.O , was set to debut. Krauskopf)
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https://reut.rs/2xCm6Aa live markets premarket Sept 24 2018
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