Oil futures trade above $97 a barrel; dollar declines vs. rivals
By Polya Lesova, MarketWatch
LONDON (MarketWatch) — U.S. stock futures straddled the flat line on Monday, as investors opted for caution ahead of a string of economic data, including personal income and pending home sales.
Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJH11 12,140, +30.00, +0.25%) gained 11 points to 12,121.
Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index (SPH11 1,323, +4.00, +0.30%) were nearly unchanged at 1,318.30, while Nasdaq 100 futures (NDH11 2,353, +7.25, +0.31%) gained 2 points to 2,347.70.
The blue-chip Dow index (DJIA 12,130, +61.95, +0.51%) slumped 260.80 points last week, or 2.1%, posting its biggest weekly point drop since the week ended August 13, 2010.
The economic calendar is busy on Monday. Data on personal income and consumer spending for January are due at 8:30 a.m. U.S. Eastern Time, to be followed by the Chicago PMI for February at 9:45 a.m. Eastern.
Then, at 10 a.m. Eastern, a report on pending home sales for January will be released.
Investors will also keep an eye on speeches from central-bank officials. William C. Dudley, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, on Monday morning is scheduled to speak at New York University on the economic outlook.
Separately, Eric S. Rosengren, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, will participate in a panel discussion in Boston on lessons learned from the global meltdown.
On the corporate front, several companies will report quarterly results, including utilities AES Corp. (AES 12.26, +0.19, +1.57%) and Edison International (EIX 36.01, +0.21, +0.59%) .
In deal news, Ventas Inc. (VTR 57.19, +1.06, +1.89%) said Monday it will acquire Nationwide Health Properties Inc. (NHP 38.96, +0.92, +2.42%) in a stock-for-stock deal valued at $7.4 billion, creating one of the biggest publicly traded REITs and the leading healthcare REIT by equity value.
In the commodity markets, April Nymex crude-oil futures gained 7 cents to $97.95 a barrel in electronic trading on Globex. Oil prices soared last week on worries about supply disruptions from Libya, which has been rocked by political unrest.
Gold futures were slightly higher at $1,411 an ounce.
The dollar index (DXY 76.84, -0.43, -0.56%) , which tracks the performance of the greenback against a basket of other major currencies, fell 0.4% to 76.900.
The euro gained 0.6% to $1.3830.
Asian markets finished mostly higher overnight. Investors digested data showing that India’s economic growth slowed to 8.2% in the fourth quarter of 2010 from the year-earlier period. Read about Asia Markets.
Most European equities were little changed in intraday trading. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 index (UK:UKX 5,992, -9.54, -0.16%) dropped 0.4%, as shares of HSBC Holdings PLC (UK:HSBA 675.30, -35.80, -5.03%) (HBC 54.65, -2.62, -4.58%) slumped nearly 5% after the banking giant’s 2010 net profit fell short of expectations. Read more about HSBC.
