Wall Street futures rose sharply after General Motors filed for bankruptcy protection in court in New York City on Monday.

The Canadian government is expected to take a 12.5% stake in GM and a United Auto Workers trust for health-care expenses would get 17.5%, according to reports.

Meanwhile, a U.S. bankruptcy judge approved the sale of substantially all Chrysler’s assets to a group led by Italy’s Fiat SpA in an opinion filed late on Sunday.

Also Sunday, two German states agreed to support a bridge loan for General Motors Corp.’s Opel unit, putting the final touches on a deal for Canada’s Magna International Inc. to acquire the automaker.

Magna will take a 20% stake in Opel and the Russian-owned Sberbank will take a 35% stake, giving their consortium a majority. GM will retain a 35% holding, while the remaining 10% will go to Opel employees.

In today’s economic news, real gross domestic product declined 1.4% in the first quarter, Statistics Canada said Monday. That’s the largest quarterly decrease since 1991.

Both domestic and international demand continued to weaken, StatsCan said. Real GDP fell 0.3% in March, the government agency added.

South of the border, U.S. home and spending data for April are scheduled for release before markets open, while the U.S. Institute for Supply Management manufacturing index for May is due at 10:00 ET.

In other M&A news, Canadian life sciences company MDS Inc. plans to narrow its contract research focus by selling its late stage operations and central laboratory divisions.

On Monday, MDS said it would sell the unit to INC Research Inc, a contract research services company, for $50 million.

In commodities news, oil rose more than 2% to a seven-month high on Monday. U.S. crude was US$1.52 higher at US$67.83 in electronic trading.

Gold futures were up US$8.20 to US$988.50 an ounce.

Overseas, Japan’s Nikkei 225 climbed 1.6% to 9,677.75, its strongest close since early October 2008. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng ended up 4% at a more than eight-month high of 18,888.59,

In Europe, the UK’s FTSE increased 1.3% to 4,475.81 points; Frankfurt’s DAX jumped 2.8% to 5,079.07 points and Paris’s CAC-40 Index was 1.9% higher at 3,340.75 points.

The Toronto Stock Exchange finished slightly lower on Friday, but a boost in commodity prices sent the Canadian dollar sharply higher, helping the currency finish with its largest monthly gain in more than 50 years.

The S&P/TSX composite index finished at 10,370.07, down 22.30 points, or 0.2%. For the week, the benchmark index gained about 4%.

The S&P/TSX Venture composite index advanced on Friday, adding 18.92 points, or 1.7%, to end at 1,124.08.

In New York, U.S. stocks rallied on Friday, helping the main stock market indexes finish with hefty monthly gains.

The Dow Jones industrial average gained 96.53 points, or 1.2%, to end at 8,500.33. For the week, the blue-chip average gained 2.7%, and for the month it added 4%.

The S&P 500 index rose 12.31 points, or 1.4%, to 919.14. The index gained 3.6% for the week and 5.3% for the month.

The Nasdaq composite index advanced 22.54 points, or 1.3%, to 1,774.33. It gained a hefty 4.9% during the week and 3.3% for the month.

IE