The ASX 200 is expected to drop as much as 0.71% at open today, according to Friday’s futures, with the Wall Street-guided red slide capping what’s been – up to this point in Week 50 – a reasonably strong rally as Christmas rushes up.

New York led global markets lower, with skittish U.S. investors pulling money out after the tech rally; the S&P 500 and Dow Jones followed each other -0.5% down.

The Dow drop in particular is notable as the index’s worst losing streak since April.

Ten-year bond yields continue to climb through the staggered end to the week, mostly helped on by the Federal Reserve’s impending policy meeting early next week. Cuts may be likely when that comes around, especially after the European Central Bank trimmed rates by 25 basis points. The Swiss National Bank was even more heavy-handed around the same time, slashing things by a very hefty 50bps.

Back home, Rio Tinto (ASX:RIO) is throwing more money into major projects with US$2.5 billion now pledged for its Rincon operation in Argentina. This marks the mining titan’s first real commercial spearhead into lithium works.

Chorus Limited (ASX:CNU) has already leapt to among the most-watched on HotCopper forums this morning too after heralding $877M to $1 billion in annual revenue.

Milk supplier Synlait (ASX:SM1) will also be tracked after increasing its forecasted base milk price for 2024/25, up to NZ$10 (50 cents higher than November).

The biggest mover of the day though will be newcomer DigiCo; the HMC Capital spinoff will join the local Aussie bourse today at midday in Sydney. The data centre operator – already billed by the AFR as “the biggest IPO of the year” – will list under DGT at $5ps and is looking to raise as much as $1.9 billion.

Elsewhere, Westpac (ASX:WBC) and Premier Investments (ASX:PMV) are hosting AGMs.

Looking at forex, the Aussie dollar is buying 63.6 US cents.

To commodities, which are in the greenback,

Iron Ore has lifted to $105.70 a tonne in Singapore,

Brent Crude is trading at $73.42,

Gold is trading at $2,681 per ounce, and, 

US natgas futures are 2.7% higher at $3.46 per gigajoule.

That’s Market Open, I’m Isaac McIntyre, stick with us for HotCopper’s Market Update.