By James Langton

(November 27 – 09:00 ET) – Markets appear set to open higher this morning. Texas governor George W. Bush has declared victory in the U.S. presidential election. Although that still seems far from certain, stocks are nevertheless rallying on the news.

Techs are pointing the way up this morning with names such as Intel, Yahoo! and JDS Uniphase up in pre-market trading.

There’s no major economic news out today on either side of the border. The Canadian election will capture some attention, but the outcome isn’t expected to impact markets.

In Europe stocks are up on the heels of strong growth expectations in technology, while economies overall are expecting to slow their pace. In London, the FTSE is up 51 points to 6,378. In Paris, the CAC 40 has gained 78 to 6,224. Germany’s DAX is up 105 to 6,769.

In M&A news, the world’s largest maker of building materials, Lafarge SA, agreed to sell a stake in one of its units for US$672 million to fund further acquisitions.

BHP Ltd. and the Rio Tinto Group are going ahead with a US$1.05 billion plan to boost output by 50% at the Chilean Escondida copper mine, the world’s largest.

Morgan Stanley Dean Witter has reportedly abandoned negotiations to buy a Japanese brokerage, and is now planning to open an office of its own in Japan.

Overnight in Asia stocks are up. Japan’s Nikkei added 405 points to close at 14,720. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng is up 226 to 14,603.

In other business news, MGI Software Corp. reported financial results for the third quarter showing a net loss per share of 12¢, up from a 21¢ a share loss last year.

Plaintree Systems reported a net loss in the second quarter of 1¢ a share, flat from last year.

Certicom has announced a strategic licensing agreement with Nortel Networks, giving Nortel a licence on Certicom’s Elliptic Curve Cryptography to provide a virtual private network solution for handheld device users.