Dados para hoje nos states: Investor jitters showing

[notiCIas]

U.S. stocks set to open lower as housing, inflation reports loom.
September 19 2006: 6:18 AM EDT


NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Concern about the housing and inflation, ahead of government reports due before the open, helped send stock futures lower Tuesday.

At 6:13 a.m. ET, both S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures were down, indicating a lower open for the major market gauges, although that could change with the 8:30 a.m. economic readings (13:30 em Portugal).

The government is due to report the Producer Price Index, its key measure of inflation pressures at the wholesale level. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com forecast that the PPI rose 0.3 percent in August, up from a 0.1 percent rise in July.

The more closely watched core PPI, which strips out food and energy prices, is expected to post a 0.2 percent gain after a 0.3 percent decline in July.

The Census Bureau will report on housing starts and building permits for August, and both are expected to show further declines, another sign of weakening in the closely watched real estate market.

Starts are forecast to be come in at an annual rate of 1.75 million, down from 1.8 million in July, while permits, a sign of builders' confidence in the market, are expected to drop to 1.74 million annual pace from 1.76 million in July.

Monday, the National Association of Home Builders' survey of members found confidence among builders at a 15-year low as its index posted its eighth straight decline.

Another trade group with a pessimistic view of the economy is the National Retail Federation. It said early Tuesday that it expects this year's holiday sales growth to fall short of last year's increase, although it is looking for a 5 percent gain in sales, year-over-year. Still that's slower than the 6.1 percent gain posted a year ago.

Discount retailer Target (Charts) on Monday raised its September forecast, saying it now expects sales at stores open at least a year to post about a 5 percent gain, up from its earlier estimate of a 3 to 5 percent rise. Shares of Target rose 1.8 percent in after-hours trading following the new guidance.

Oil eased. U.S. light crude slipped 8 cents to $63.72 a barrel in electronic trading. Brent crude traded in London was 10 cents lower at $63.95.

Treasury prices retreated, raising the yield on the 10-year note to 4.82 percent from 4.80 percent late Monday.

Major indexes in Asia closed little changed, with Japan's Nikkei closing up 0.1 percent. Meanwhile stocks were lower in Europe in early trading.

The dollar gained against the euro but slipped versus the yen.

In corporate news, software provider Microsoft (Charts) announced it is launching a online-video sharing service, entering the space made popular by YouTube.

Toshiba (Charts) became the latest laptop computer maker to recall batteries made by Sony (Charts), the latest in a series of embarrassing battery problems for Sony. Dell (Charts) and Apple (Charts) have already recalled Sony batteries used in those companies' laptops.