More housing worries send stock futures lower

    NEW YORK (AP) - Wall Street looked to open lower Tuesday after
homebuilder Toll Brothers Inc. said it couldn’t project a profit
for 2009 and Starbucks Corp. reported earnings missed Wall Street
expectations.
    No economic reports were scheduled with the government closed
for Veterans Day, so investors will look to earnings reports for
direction during the session. And the Toll Brothers and Starbucks
reports pointed to ongoing problems in two of the market’s greatest
areas of concern: housing and consumer spending.
    Toll Brothers said fourth-quarter revenue fell 41 percent from
the year-ago period. Chairman and Chief Executive Robert Toll said
in a statement the company was “upended by the past month’s
financial crisis,“ and that the economic uncertainty made it
difficult to predict a profit next year.
    Meanwhile, Starbucks reported lower sales across the coffee
chain led to a profit that fell below analysts’ expectations. The
quarter’s results came at the end of a transition year for the
coffee retailer, in which former Chief Executive Howard Schultz
returned as CEO and chairman.
    The financial sector will again be under scrutiny after American
Express Co. won approval from the Federal Reserve to become a
commercial bank. That will allow the credit card giant to accept
deposits and permanently access government financing that’s been
used by other banks amid the credit crisis.
    The market will also be looking for news from General Motors
Corp., whose shares on Monday plunged to their lowest point in 60
years as some industry analysts predicted the automaker would
collapse without a government bailout. In addition, GM announced it
would cut 1,900 factory jobs on top of the 3,600 cuts announced on
Friday.
    Stock futures indicated a lower start for the markets. Dow Jones
industrial futures shed 123 points to 8,764, Standard & Poor’s 500
futures fell 11.50 points to 910.00, while Nasdaq 100 futures
dropped 16.5 points to 1,240.00.
    Oil prices fell to near an 18-month low at $60 a barrel Tuesday
as optimism waned that a huge economic stimulus plan in China will
avert a prolonged slowdown in the global economy. Light, sweet
crude for December delivery was down $1.47 at $60.94 a barrel,
after falling as low as $60.29, in electronic trading on the New
York Mercantile Exchange.
    Overseas, Japan’s Nikkei closed down 3 percent and Hong Kong
Hang Seng fell 4.77 percent. In European trading, London’s FTSE 100
was down 2.09 percent, Germany’s DAX gave up 2.10 percent, and
France’s CAC-40 fell 2.49 percent.
   
    (Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)