By James Langton

(March 13 – 09:00 ET) – After yesterday’s massive selloff and continued market slides in Asia and Europe, stocks in North America are looking to break the selling cycle.

U.S. futures are pointing to an open on the upside this morning, with bargain hunters moving into stocks that were hammered yesterday, including Cisco Systems Inc., Oracle Corp. and Intel Corp.

Earlier this morning retail sales in the United States were reported down 0.2% for February, off 0.3% excluding autos. The slide came as a surprise to economists who saw slight gains in the cards. Although this seems to confirm the deepening U.S. slowdown, optimistic traders are hoping it will spark more aggressive rate cuts in the U.S. As a result, they see the numbers as good news for stocks.

In Europe, traders are showing any such optimism. Some are expecting greater weakness in telecoms such as Nokia Oyj, after Ericsson AB hammered the market yesterday with lowered expectations. Cable & Wireless plc is lowering its profits sights for this year, too.

Another fear in Europe is that signs of inflation may prevent rate cuts there. Against this backdrop, the FTSE is down 61 points to 5,765. The CAC 40 has dropped 67 points to 5,175. Germany’s DAX has shed 80 points to 5,966.

Overnight in Asia, stocks followed the big U.S. selloff with another big slide of their own. Japan’s Nikkei dropped 352 points to 11,820. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng surrendered 284 points, off intra-day lows mind you, to close at 13,493.

In M&A news, Tyco International Ltd. is buying financing firm CIT Group Inc. for US$9.2 billion in stock and cash.

In other news, CryptoLogic Inc. plans to buy back 1 million of its own shares, subject to a maximum price of $19 a share and a minimum of $17.

Boliden Limited reported a net loss of $407.5 million or $1.87 a share for the fourth quarter and $3.45 a share for the year ended December 31, compared with a net loss of 11¢ a share for the fourth quarter of 1999 and 68¢ a share for the year 1999.