The Toronto stock market was set for a higher open Wednesday amid expectations that the Federal Reserve will indicate it won’t be cutting back on its key stimulus of asset purchases until next year.

The Canadian dollar was ahead 0.18 of a cent to 95.69 cents US.

U.S. futures were also higher ahead of a mid-afternoon announcement at the end of the Fed’s two-day interest rate meeting.

The Dow Jones industrial futures gained 41 points to 15,657, the Nasdaq futures rose 15.3 points to 3,399.3 and the S&P 500 futures climbed four points to 1,771.5.

The expectation that the Fed will carry on with its US$85 billion of bond purchases is a reversal from just six weeks ago at the time of the last meeting, when it was generally thought the central bank judged the economy strong enough to start cutting back.

Since then, a 16-day partial government shutdown shaved an estimated $25 billion from economic growth this quarter. And a batch of tepid economic data pointed to a still-subpar economy, all pointing to a Federal Reserve content to leave tapering until 2014.

The TSX closed at fresh two-year highs on Tuesday, supported by the financial sector as all five of Canada’s big banks hit 52-week highs. The stocks have surged in recent months as the housing sector shows no sign of coming in for a hard landing while economic growth is slow and steady and banks have turned in strong profits.

The sector is up 5.4 per cent for this month alone. Strong performance by banks and insurance companies has helped push the TSX up seven per cent year to date with most of the gain coming during October.

The bullish sentiment has been evident in the U.S. for far longer, with the Dow industrials up almost 20 per cent year to date and closed at an all-time high on Wednesday.

Commodity prices were mixed with December crude on the New York Mercantile Exchange down 95 cents to US$97.25 a barrel.

December copper jumped four cents to US$3.32 a pound while December bullion gained $5.60 an ounce.

On the earnings front, General Motors third-quarter profit beat Wall Street expectations. The company earned $698 million in the quarter, or 45 cents per share. That compares with $1.48 billion, or 89 cents per share, a year ago. Excluding $900 million in one-time items, it made 96 cents per share, two cents better than expected.

Revenue rose four per cent to $39 billion, just short of Wall Street’s estimate.

Investors are also taking earnings from several companies Wednesday including software company Open Text (TSX:OTC), Canadian Oil Sands (TSX:COS) and Suncor Energy (TSX:SU), all after the market close.

In other corporate news, Wi-LAN Inc. (TSX:WIN) which generates revenue by licensing technology patents, says it’s exploring a broad range of strategic alternatives in light of its current low share price. That includes a possible sale of the company, a new dividend policy or other business models. Wi-LAN’s announcement comes less than a week after its shares plunged nearly 23 per cent following an unfavourable jury decision in a legal battle with Apple Inc. (Nasdaq:AAPL).

European bourses advanced amid a new survey that pointed to an increase in confidence in the eurozone’s fragile economic recovery. The European Union’s statistics office said economic sentiment in the 17-nation eurozone rose for the sixth time in a row in October, increasing by 0.9 points to 97.8 for the eurozone and by 1.1 points to 101.8 for the EU’s 28 nations.

London’s FTSE 100 index rose 0.45 per cent, Frankfurt’s DAX gained 0.32 per cent and the Paris CAC 40 was up 0.5 per cent.

Earlier, Asia’s key benchmark, the Nikkei 225 in Tokyo, closed 1.2 per cent higher, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng climbed two per cent while China’s Shanghai Composite finished up 1.5 per cent and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 shed 0.2 per cent.