Source: The Canadian Press

North American stock markets appeared set for a weak start to the trading day Wednesday as investors looked to a pair of reports for an indication of how the American economy is faring.

The Canadian dollar was ahead 0.08 of a cent to 97.75 cents US.

U.S. futures pointed to a modest pullback as investors took in news of modest job gains from payroll company ADP and ahead of the Institute for Supply Management’s reading on the service sector.

The Dow Jones industrial futures inched up four points to 10,598, the Nasdaq futures declined 1.5 points to 1,891.5 while the S&P 500 futures added 0.5 of a point to 1,118.8.

The ADP report showed that private sector employers added 42,000 jobs last month, on top of 13,000 in June. The data was released two days before the U.S. government issues its non-farm payrolls report for July and economists expect it to show the private sector produced a modest 90,000 jobs.

Meanwhile, the ISM’s services index likely dipped to 53 in July from 53.8 a month earlier. Any reading above 50 indicates the sector is expanding.

A slight slowdown in services activity would match the modest pullback seen Monday when ISM released its manufacturing survey.

The data follows the trend seen over the past few months that the U.S. economy continues to grow, but at a sluggish pace. Economic reports over the past couple of days have begun to again overshadow quarterly earnings, which were mostly upbeat and drove stocks higher in July.

Oil prices were off slightly in the wake of a report which showed U.S. crude inventories fell less than expected last week, suggesting demand in the U.S. remains sluggish.

Benchmark crude for September delivery was down 21 cents to $82.34 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract gained $1.21 to settle at a three month high of US$82.55 a barrel on Tuesday.

U.S. crude inventories fell by 776,000 barrels last week, according to the American Petroleum Institute. That was less than a drop of 1.2 million barrels that analysts expected, according to a survey by Platts, the energy information arm of McGraw-Hill Cos.

Other commodities were mixed with the December bullion contract on the Nymex ahead $11.50 to US$1,199 an ounce while September copper in New York was unchanged at US$3.36 a pound.

In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 stock average closed down by 2.1%, the Shanghai Composite Index added 0.4% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng advanced 0.4%.

London’s FTSE 100 index lost 1.04%, Frankfurt’s DAX dipped 0.15% and the Paris CAC 40 was off 0.63%.

Elsewhere, BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Ltd. (TSX:RIM) said Tuesday that it has not agreed to heightened surveillance by the Indian government. Talks are continuing over access to emails and other data sent from the smart phones. Like the United Arab Emirates, India is pushing for greater access to encrypted information sent by the phones that gets routed through the Canadian company’s computers overseas.

RIM officially unveiled its latest smartphone Tuesday, a new touchscreen model with a slide-out keyboard designed to challenge Apple’s iPhone.

On the earnings front, fertilizer producer Agrium Inc. (TSX:AGU) reported its second highest quarterly net earnings of US$506-million in the second quarter. The Calgary company earned $3.20 a diluted share, compared with earnings of $370 million, or $2.35 a share, for the same quarter of 2009. Net sales in the quarter rose to nearly $4.4 billion from US$4.1 billion.

Industrial products maker ATS Automation Tooling Systems Inc. (TSX:ATA) says profits moved higher in the first quarter, and that the company plans to separate its troubled Photowatt solar energy division. The company said consolidated net income was $6.4 million for the three months ended June 27, an increase from $300,000 in the comparable period ended June 28, 2009. Revenues dipped to $151.1 million from $152.7 million.

Toronto-based wealth management and mutual fund firm DundeeWealth Inc. (TSX:DW) said Wednesday that quarterly earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization grew to $74.5 million from $40.7 million a year ago. Revenues increased 23% to $231.1 million.