TORONTO – The Toronto stock market looked set to open lower amid earnings news and acquisition activity in the Western Canadian oilpatch.

The Canadian dollar edged up 0.05 of a cent to 91.37 cents US.

New York futures were also lower as traders looked to see how severe winter weather impacted housing starts during January.

Economists looked for U.S. housing starts data to fall by 10 per cent to an annualized rate of 899,000.

The Dow Jones industrial futures fell 53 points to 16,054, the Nasdaq futures were down 7.7 points to 3,667.3 while the S&P 500 futures declined 6.75 points to 1,830.75.

The TSX and New York markets put in a lacklustre performance Tuesday amid manufacturing and real estate data that showed severe winter weather is having an impact on U.S. economic performance.

Also, traders will look to the release of the minutes from the latest Federal Reserve meeting mid-afternoon, where the central bank moved to further taper its bond purchases to $64 billion a month. Traders hoped to see some guidance from the Fed on future tapering.

Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (TSX:CNQ) will be in focus on the TSX after the energy giant announced that it will pay $3.125 billion cash to buy conventional oil and gas assets near its core areas in Western Canada in a major land deal with Devon Canada.

On the earnings front, Yamana Gold (TSX:YRI) (NYSE:AUY) posted a quarterly net loss of US$583.9 million or 78 cents per share, compared with a net profit of US$169.2 million or 23 cents per share a year ago. Revenue fell to US$420.6 million from US$629.5 million. Adjusted earnings were US$36.7 million or five cents per share compared with $197.4 million or 26 cents in the prior-year period. Its shares were down 3.1 per cent in pre-market trading in New York as the Toronto-based gold miner also cut its quarterly dividend almost in half to 3.75 cents per share.

Quebec-based power producer Boralex Inc. (TSX:BLX) said its quarterly cash flow from operations was $16.1 million or 43 cents per share, up from $13.5 million or 36 cents per share a year ago. Boralex will also pay its first dividend, 13 cents per shares.

Miner Sherritt International (TSX:S) will post its latest earnings Wednesday.

Elsewhere, Bombardier Transportation confirmed today that it has won a contract with Transport for London worth about US$2.1 billion to supply 65 trains and a maintenance depot for Crossrail.

Commodities were mixed as the March crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange gained 53 cents to US$102.96 a barrel.

March copper was unchanged at US$3.29 a pound while April bullion faded $5.60 to US$1,318.80 an ounce.

European markets were in the red as London’s FTSE 100 index and Frankfurt’s DAX declined about 0.4 per cent while the Paris CAC 40 lost 0.23 per cent.

Earlier in Asia, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 lost 0.5 per cent while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.3 per cent.