North American stocks are poised to open lower Thursday, despite positive sales reports from U.S. retailers.

Retailers reported solid sales for January, aided by holiday gift-card redemptions and unusually warm weather that boosted early sales of spring fashion lines. Wal-Mart Stores said same-store sales rose 4.7% during January, in-line with the company’s forecast.

In economic news, fourth-quarter U.S. productivity decreased 0.6%, after rising 4.5% in the third quarter.

Also, the European Central Bank met and decided to leave its key interest rate steady at 2.25%.

Light, sweet crude oil was down 22¢ to US$66.34 in electronic trading after falling sharply yesterday in afternoon trading.

In earnings news, Teck Cominco Ltd. said it earned $510 million in the fourth quarter, up from $285 million a year ago, pushed higher by prices for copper, zinc and coal.

After markets closed Wednesday, TSX Group Inc. reported a 51% increase in full-year profit to $103.4 million.

Tyco International reported today that first-quarter net income fell 22% on 1.1% higher sales.

After the bell, Amazon.com will report fourth-quarter earnings.

In other news, General Motors said it plans to spend up to US$15 billion in the next five years to outsource IT work and awarded contracts for about half that amount to Electronic Data Systems, Hewlett-Packard, Capgemini and other firms.



European stock markets turned lower Thursday after early gains, as losses in the oil sector following slightly disappointing Royal Dutch Shell results offset some upbeat results elsewhere.

The U.K. FTSE 100 index declined 0.2%, while the French CAC 40 index weakened 0.4%.

Asian shares ended mixed, but Tokyo shares rose to a five-year high, bouncing back from the previous day’s losses. The Nikkei 225 Stock Average gained 1.4% on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

Toronto stocks closed mixed on Wednesday, as technology shares gained while the energy and mining shares stalled.

The S&P/TSX composite index closed up 6.50 points, or 0.05%, at 11,952.14 after breaking the 12,000 mark earlier in the session.

The information technology group was by far the biggest gainer of the day, with a 4.74% jump.

Nortel rose 25¢, or 7.33%, to $3.66 after it announced a joint-venture with China’s largest telecom equipment maker Huawei Technologies.

Shares in Research In Motion (jumped $6.75, or 8.74%, to $84 after the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office sided with the BlackBerry portable e-mail device maker by issuing a non-final rejection of a fifth patent at the center of its legal battle with patent holding company NTP Inc.

The junior S&P/TSX Venture composite index added 8.27 points, or 0.32%, to finish at 2,564.13.

In New York, U.S. stocks rallied on as a stronger-than-expected profit from aerospace company Boeing Co. the drop in oil prices offset Google Inc.’s disappointing earnings.

The Dow Jones industrial average was up 89.09 points, or 0.82%, at 10,953.95.

The S&P 500 was up 2.38 points, or 0.19%, at 1,282.46. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index was up 4.74 points, or 0.21%, at 2,310.56.