Stock market today: Honda-Nissan merger talks shake up otherwise quiet morning on Wall Street

Wall Street pointed slightly lower early Monday, kicking off a holiday-shortened week with little market-moving news expected.

Futures for the S&P 500 were down less than 0.1% before the bell Monday, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.2%.

Japanese automakers Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Corp. announced that they will work toward a possible merger that might also include Nissan’s smaller alliance partner Mitsubishi Motors Corp. Honda’s shares, which fell after news of the talks on a deal surfaced last week, jumped 16%. Nissan shares were down less than 1%.

Eli Lilly rose nearly 2% after it announced that the Food and Drug Administration had approved its Zepbound drug as the first and only prescription medicine for adults with sleep apnea. Zepbound was already approved and on the market to treat obesity.