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NY heads for soft start; autos, Greenspan eyed
Tuesday March 2, 6:12 am ET
By Huw Jones


LONDON, March 2 (Reuters) - Wall Street was heading for a lacklustre opening on Tuesday with a dearth of corporate news or data to spur further advances and overcome investor concern about interest rates.
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U.S. domestic car and truck sales in February are due to be released on Tuesday, but at no set time.

Chrysler, the U.S. arm of DaimlerChrysler (XETRA:DCXGn.DE - News) auto group said on Monday the U.S. market had been slower than most in the industry had expected last month.

Meanwhile, Italy's Fiat (Milan:FIA.MI - News) said on Tuesday it will use U.S. partner General Motors Corp (NYSE:GM - News) to build a new large car that is due to hit the road in 2005.

Investors will keep an eye on Belgian brewer Interbrew (Brussels:INTB.BR - News) which said on Tuesday it could take a large stake in Brazilian peer AmBev (Sao Paolo:AMBV4.SA - News).

Analysts have said any such deal would probably face a competing bid from America's Anheuser-Busch (NYSE:BUD - News), the world's largest brewer.

GREENSPAN

On the economy front, U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan speaks on the current account before an Economics Club of New York luncheon at 1730 GMT.

Concerns over how to narrow the current account deficit has helped to grease the dollar's slide in recent months.

Meanwhile, a sharp rise in the employment component of Monday's Institute of Supply Management's manufacturing index for February bolstered expectations for a strong U.S. payrolls number on Friday - the week's key economic figure.

A revival in payrolls could hand the Federal Reserve an excuse to raise interest rates, analysts said.

By 1058 GMT, U.S. stock index futures were pointing to a slightly weaker start on Wall Street after it clocked up gains on Monday.

"It looks as if we will see an element of profit taking in the U.S. at the open," said Tom Hougaard of City Index financial spread betters. Other dealers said there were no movements of significant in U.S. shares traded in Europe.