The outlook for trading is positive this morning ahead of a big week for major economic releases and earnings reports, including most of the country’s big banks.

Investors will be getting reports on current account, retail sales and weekly earnings on Thursday, and fourth-quarter gross domestic product on Friday.

Bank of Montreal will begin the quarterly earnings season by the big banks on Tuesday, followed on Thursday by CIBC and TD, and Friday by RBC.

In the U.S. there are no major economic reports scheduled for today. Investors will be looking for reports later in the week such as tomorrow’s consumer-confidence numbers and Friday’s release of the preliminary fourth-quarter gross domestic product.

A lack of new U.S. economic data could leave currencies at the mercy of comments from Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, who is scheduled to deliver a number of speeches over the next few days. Any hint that the Fed might be raising interest rates would probably translate into more dollar gains.

In Europe at midday, London’s FTSE100 Share Index is up 0.5% to 4,538.00. In Paris the CAC40 Index is 0.4% higher at 3.749.32 and Frankfurt’s Xetra Dax is up 0.5% at 4,092.59.

In Asia during its Monday trading, the Nikkei Average closed up 148.27 points, or 1.4%, at 10,868.96.

In Hong Kong, shares closed lower. Traders said the market is likely to remain lacklustre, until blue chip banks HSBC and Hang Seng Bank report their earnings early next week. The Hang Seng Index ended down 103.3 points or 0.7% at 13,765.07.

On Friday, Toronto’s S&P/TSX composite index declined 57.16 points Friday to 8,641.93.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 45.70, or 0.4%, to 10,619.03, while the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 8.03, or 0.4%, to 2,037.93 and the S&P 500 slipped 2.95 to 1,144.11.