North American markets appeared ready to start the week with mild declines, as attention turned to weakness in Asian markets and commodities shifted lower.
The caution follows moves from Hong Kong to tighten mortgage lending, an effort being made to help slow the rise of home prices.
The Canadian dollar backed off 0.12 of a cent to 102.85 cents US.
The Dow Jones industrial futures were down 27 points to 13,495, the Nasdaq futures declined 4.5 points to 2,845.75 while the S&P 500 futures lost 3.5 points to 1,455.5.
Global stock markets were muted Monday as the boost faded from the Federal Reserve’s announcement last week of new measures to energize the U.S. economy.
Signs that European governments will take longer than expected to agree the details and set up their banking supervisor also weighed on sentiment.
In early European trading, Germany’s DAX fell 0.2% to 7,397.23 while France’s CAC 40 dropped 0.5% to 3,563.57. Britain’s FTSE 100 index lost 0.2% to 5,901.80.
The October crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 28 cents to US$98.72.
Copper prices for December were down three cents to US$3.81 a pound. Copper, viewed as an economic barometer because it is used in so many industries, surged 19 cents last week.
Bullion was unchanged at US$1,772.70 an ounce.
Global stock markets rallied late last week after the Fed announced it planned to buy US$40 billion of mortgage bonds a month for as long as necessary as part of a strategy known as quantitative easing aimed at encouraging people to borrow money and spend it. The Fed also extended its pledge to keep short-term interest rates low until 2015, a year longer than its previous target.