Today’s not a good day for those crazy dreamers trying to revolutionize how we power our cars, brew our coffee or track our workouts. Tesla, Keurig Green Mountain and Fitbit are all taking tumbles this premarket morning.

But it’s still early in this long day, and maybe those pioneering companies’ stocks will turn around by the closing bell, just as Apple AAPL, +3.03% erased its morning loss yesterday.

It’s also not a good day for China bulls, as a chart watcher — who called the recent top there — hints at a further dive. Read on to our call of the day for details.

Where it’s not so bad right now, though, is within key crannies of the U.S. economy. Our chart of the day comes from pundit Scott Grannis, who says that “while it’s clear that overall economic activity remains disappointing, there are surprising pockets of strength.”

But back to those revolutionaries getting hung out to dry: The Fly is questioning Fitbit’s FIT, -0.94% very premise and suggesting an alternative to its wearable devices.

“People are such slackers; they’ve resorted to a gadget to count their steps. Listen to me: Walk or run until you can’t anymore. After you’ve exhausted your energy reserves, rest up and drink lots of wine,” the iBankCoin blogger writes in his latest post.

When it comes to Keurig Green Mountain US:GMCR, which had wince-worthy sales and is making job cuts, our friends at StockTwits have been marveling at the sheer speed and scale of the post-earnings slide:

Tesla Motors’s TSLA, +1.63% trouble appears to be that it backed off its full-year target for deliveries. A parody Twitter account for CEO Elon Musk, who was an inspiration for the Iron Man movies, has this comeback:

The next hope among would-be revolutionaries might be... Zynga? Uh-oh. The games developer ZNGA, +2.00% is trying to change how people waste their time, and it’s due to unveil quarterly results after the closing bell.

“Shares of the ailing social video-game company have been wallowing in the mud, unable to escape the $2 price zone,” writes Tyler Craig in an earnings preview over at InvestorPlace. “Unfortunately, strong upside earnings surprises have been a rarity for ZNGA stock, so color me skeptical.”

Earnings

Michael Kors US:KORS share are jumping, while PETA-favorite SeaWorld SEAS, -9.77% is headed in the other direction after reporting earnings. Allergan US:AGN swung to a loss, with results from the New York Times Co. NYT, +0.86% still to come ahead of the bell. Bojangles’ US:BOJA and Nvidia NVDA, +2.69% come after the close.

Read: What to expect from Bojangles’ earnings

Key market gauges

WTI crude CLU25, is back to its losing ways, with Brent UK:LCOU5 also falling. European equities SXXP, -3.24% are mostly lower, while Chinese stocks SHCOMP, -0.12% ended down on worries about Beijing’s support for equities, though the Nikkei NIK, +0.17% gained.

Futures for the S&P 500 US:ESU5, Dow US:YMU5 and Nasdaq 100 US:NQU5 are higher after trading lower earlier. The dollar DXY, -0.14% is also modestly higher.

The quote

“I’ve got another 7 or 8 years left. He has 2. That’s the final chapter. Game on.” — Tom Brady, not so gracious in talking about his rivalry with Peyton Manning, in a wide-ranging Boston Globe story about the Patriots QB’s released emails.

MSNBC

The economy

While Friday’s jobs report is still the main event this week, we’ll get an appetizer at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time, when the latest reading on initial weekly jobless claims is due. Speaking of jobs figures, Greece’s unemployment rate has declined — to 25%.

The buzz

Amazon.com

Bill Ackman must really like Oreo cookies. The high-profile activist investor has amassed a $5.5 billion stake in Oreos and Ritz producer Mondelez MDLZ, -1.18% , according to a filing late Wednesday.

Isn’t the presidential election still more than a year away? No matter, the NFL season hasn’t started yet, so lots of people surely will watch tonight’s first Republican presidential debate.

In London, everyone is fired up about the Bank of England’s “Super Thursday,” which should deliver an unusually large barrage of data. Plus the Tube strike is still riling people up.

The chart

A possible indicator of global economic health — the Baltic Dry Index — has been slumping for years, but it now has doubled in the past two months.

That’s “quite a surprise, considering that the news out of China continues to be gloomy. Maybe things are not so gloomy after all,” writes Scott Grannis over at Calafia Beach Pundit.

The former chief economist at Western Asset Management has put out the chart below, along with nine other surprisingly strong charts. He concludes that “there is very little reason to be pessimistic about the near-term prospects for the U.S. economy.”

The Baltic Dry Index is a gauge of global shipping costs, and much like copper prices or freight-car loadings, economists and traders have long closely watched this index, MarketWatch’s Bill Watts explained last year.

Calafia Beach Pundit, Bloomberg

The call

After a record-setting dive last week by Chinese stocks, they at least haven’t been falling as hard this week, even amid fresh reports of Chinese retail investors fleeing.

But Chinese equities still could be in for much more pain, according to Thomas Schroeder at Chart Partners Group. He’s known for successfully calling the top for Chinese stocks earlier this year.

The Shanghai Composite SHCOMP, -0.12% , which closed at 3,661.54 on Thursday, could fall as low as 3,100 or even to 2,500, he told MarketWatch.

“I need to break below 3,400 to get to 3,100, but longer term, I think we could get to 2,500,” he said in a phone interview.

Factors hitting China include sinking commodity prices and a stronger dollar, the technical analyst said. Hat tip goes to Bloomberg for highlighting Schroeder’s call first.

Random reads

Majoring in jesting may finally pay off as hiring picks up in the jester trade.

“The world is demonstrably worse than when I started,” Jon Stewart says as his 16-year run at “The Daily Show” winds down.

Count Stephen King among Donald Trump’s critics, as the author offers a suggestion

Seventy years ago on this day, the Enola Gay dropped the world’s first atom bomb on Hiroshima.

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