US STOCKS-Wall St set to open sharply lower as China virus fear mounts

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* Travel stocks hit by extended Lunar New Year holidays
* Banks follow U.S. Treasury yields lower
* Oil knocks energy shares down
* Futures down: Dow 1.53%, S&P 1.54%, Nasdaq 1.83%

(Adds comment, updates prices)
By Sruthi Shankar
Jan 27 (Reuters) - U.S. stock indexes were set to open more
than 1% lower on Monday on concerns about the financial fallout
of a fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak in China as the country
extended the Lunar New Year holidays and businesses shut down
some operations.
Travel-related stocks, including airlines, casinos and
hotels, were the worst-hit in premarket trading, with several
cities in China in lockdown for contagion fears and new cases
being reported from across the world.
Wynn Resorts Ltd WYNN.O , Melco Resorts & Entertainment Ltd
MLCO.O and Las Vegas Sands Corp LVS.N , which have large
operations in China, were down between 6% and 8%. United
Airlines Holdings Inc UAL.O and American Airlines Group Inc
AAL.O fell 3.7% and 4.5%, respectively.
Shares of some tech heavyweights that enjoyed a strong rally
recently were also down. Apple Inc AAPL.O , Alphabet Inc
GOOGL.O and Amazon.com Inc AMZN.O were all down about 2%.
Yum China Holdings Inc YUMC.N fell 7% after the company
said it had temporarily closed some of its KFC and Pizza Hut
stores in Wuhan. The death toll from the outbreak in China rose to 81 on
Monday. While a small number of cases linked to people who
travelled from Wuhan have been confirmed in more than 10
countries, including Thailand, France, Japan and the United
States, no deaths have been reported outside China. Wall Street's fear gauge, the CBOE Volatility index .VIX
jumped to its highest since Oct. 10.
"The coronavirus will not validate or invalidate the present
market multiple, it will just elevate volatility due to the
embedded uncertainty of things," David Bahnsen, chief investment
officer of The Bahnsen Group, wrote in a client note.
"The Dow is up a stunning 3,000 points in just over three
months – it hardly needs an excuse to see volatility elevated."
The benchmark S&P 500 .SPX recorded its worst week in six
months on Friday as investors flocked to safer assets such as
gold and government bonds. That sent yields on U.S. Treasuries lower, putting pressure
on shares of Bank of America Corp BAC.N , Citigroup Inc C.N
and JPMorgan Chase & Co JPM.N . US/
At 9:00 a.m. ET, Dow e-minis 1YMcv1 dropped 443 points, or
1.53%. S&P 500 e-minis EScv1 fell 50.75 points, or 1.54% and
Nasdaq 100 e-minis NQcv1 slid 167.75 points, or 1.83%.
Shares in oil majors Exxon Mobil Corp XOM.N and Chevron
Corp CVX.N fell about 1.5% each as crude price dropped below
$60 per barrel as the outbreak stoked fears of slowing oil
demand. O/R
Fourth-quarter earnings season will kick into high gear this
week with 141 of the S&P 500 companies expected to report this
week including Apple, Microsoft Corp MSFT.O and Boeing Co
BA.N .
No.1 U.S. homebuilder D.R. Horton Inc DHI.N rose 0.5%
after raising the upper end of its forecast for full-year home
sales.