The Toronto stock market appeared set to open little changed as traders look to a meeting by the U.S. Federal Reserve and what the central bank may decide to do about cutting back on asset purchases.
The S&P/TSX composite index tacked on 58.71 points to close Monday at 13,184.41
The Canadian dollar crept up 0.05 cents to 94.44 cents U.S. early Tuesday
In corporate news, Saputo Inc. says it’s willing to pay substantially more for Australia’s Warrnambool Cheese and Butter if it can get as much as 90% of its stock. The company is maintaining its base offer at AU$9 per share but says it will pay as much as AU$9.60 cash per share if it gets at least 90% of WCB’s stock. That would value the deal at $510 million.
On the economic calendar, Statistics Canada reported this morning that manufacturing sales increased 1.0% in October over the month before, contrary to projections of a 0.3% loss. The agency says sales thus reached their highest level since May of last year.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange slid 3.81 points Monday to 890.66
ON WALLSTREET
Markets were muted Tuesday morning, with investors still trying to guess what the Federal Reserve has in store for later this week.
Ahead of the opening bell, futures for the Dow Jones Industrials took on 17 points, or 0.1%, to 15,840. Futures for the S&P 500 eked up 0.4 points to 1,780.70, and futures for the NASDAQ gained 2.5 points to 3,472.50
In corporate news, shares of Herbalife surged more than 10% in after-hours trading Monday after PricewaterhouseCoopers' re-audits of the company's financial results came back clean. Herbalife has been battling accusations of financial wrongdoing from investors such as Bill Ackman, who has repeatedly called it a pyramid scheme.
GlaxoSmithKline said it was scrapping bonuses for sales staff that are based on sales to doctors, and will stop paying health care professionals to attend conferences.
Shares of Boeing jumped after the aerospace giant announced a 50% dividend increase and $10-billion U.S. stock buyback program.
The Fed's final monetary policy meeting of 2013 wraps up Wednesday, and investors are eager to find out when the central bank might begin to cut back its massive stimulus program. Some think the so-called taper may come sooner than expected.
Deutsche Bank chief economist Peter Hooper is predicting that the Fed will immediately announce plans to cut back its monthly bond buying by anywhere from $5 billion to $15 billion U.S.
Investors are also waiting for the U.S. Department of Labor to release its monthly Consumer Price Index this morning.
European markets declined in morning trading. France's CAC 40 index fell nearly 1%.
Asian markets ended the day with mixed results. The Nikkei 225 in Japan popped up by 0.8%, while markets in China edged lower.
Oil prices dropped 27 cents to $97.21 U.S. a barrel
Gold prices fell $12.60 at $1,231.80 U.S. an ounce.
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