Retail Sales & The Dollar

Good morning. Futures are positive as the dollar drops following comments from China and strength in overseas markets. In addition, we have a better than expected retail sales report (primary due to auto sales which was up +8.3%) and a pullback in manufacturing.

In other news, Japan rebounds with 4.8% GDP growth, BlackRock says central banks to be net buyers of gold, Lowe's sees signs of improved performance in some of the hardest-hit housing markets, Sony's CEO sees no electronics rebound, Buffett says his businesses has bottomed, General Motors plans to repay U.S. loan, a setback for Merck's cholesterol drug and regulators shut down three more banks. Finally, we also have a little bit of M&A activity as JPMorgan is set to buy 50% it doesn't already own in U.K. stock broker Cazenove, Citigroup said it will sell its 93.5% stake in Japanese telemarketer Bellystem24 and Cisco Systems sweetened its bid for Norway's video-conferencing-equipment maker Tandberg.

Read more of my premarket report.