U.S. stock futures higher in pre-market trading for Friday, June 01. The Nasdaq Futures is trading at 6,999.75 up with +0.33% percent or  +23.00 point.The Dow Futures is trading at 24,538.00 up with +0.50% percent or 121.00 point.The S&P 500 Futures is trading at 2,717.75 up with +0.45% percent or  +12.25 point.

In overnight trading in the Eastern Hemisphere,Japan’s Nikkei 225 is trading at 22,171.35  with a loss of  -0.14% percent or -30.47 point. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng is trading at 30,498.30 up with +0.098% percent or +29.74 point. China’s Shanghai Composite is trading at 3,075.14  with a loss of  -0.66% percent or -20.34 point. India’s BSE Sensex is trading at 35,321.49 with a loss of – 0.0025% percent or  -0.89  point at 12:15 PM.The FTSE 100 is trading at 7,731.37 up with +0.69% percent or +53.09 point. Germany’s DAX is trading at 12,721.39 up with +0.92% percent or +116.50 point. France’s CAC 40 is trading at 5,465.00 up with +1.23% percent or +66.10 point. The Stoxx Europe 600 is trading at 386.89 up with +1.00% percent or +3.83 point.

Friday’s Factors and Events

(NYSE: GM) announced this morning that the SoftBank Vision Fund will invest $2.25 billion in GM Cruise, the automaker’s self-driving subsidiary, as Cruise gears up to deploy self-driving taxis at scale in 2019.

This is a very big deal with implications that go far beyond the cash that the fund is investing in GM Cruise. Put another way, GM didn’t do this because it needed the money — this is about something much larger.

GM president Dan Ammann, SoftBank Investment Advisers’ managing partner Michael Ronen, and GM CEO Mary Barra with a GM Cruise self-driving vehicle. A SoftBank fund will invest $2.25 billion in GM’s self-driving subsidiary, GM Cruise. Image source: General Motors

Thursday’s Activity

For the day The Nasdaq Composite is trading at 7,442.12  with a loss of -0.27% percent or  -20.34 point.the Dow is trading at 24,415.84  with a loss of  -1.02% percent or -251.94 point. The S&P 500 is trading at 2,705.27 with  a loss of -0.69% percent or -18.74 point.

Other leading market index closes included the small-cap Russell 2000 Index closed at 1,633.61 with a loss of -0.87% percent or -14.38 point; the S&P 600 Small-Cap Index closed at 1,007.54   with a loss of  -1.07% percent or -10.92 point; the S&P 400 Mid-Cap Index closed at 1,946.43  with a loss of  -1.09% percent or  -21.53 point; the S&P 100 Index closed at 1,188.91  with a loss of -0.50% percent or  -5.99 point; the Russell 3000 Index closed at 1,610.67  with  a loss of -0.71% percent or  -11.47 point; the Russell 1000 Index closed at 1,502.31 with a loss of  -0.69% percent or   – 10.48 point;