Early trading in Wall Street futures are up on news of an 11% rise in quarterly profit at Oracle. But European markets are down on renewed fears of terrorism.

Statistics Canada is reporting that 21,200 jobs disappeared in February and the jobless rate remained at 7.4%. Economists had been looking for an increase of at least 15,000 jobs.

The good news is that the country experienced an increase of 11,400 full-time positions. But that increase was offset by a drop of 32,500 part-time jobs. Twelve thousand factory jobs vanished. Construction hiring was also weak.

In a separate report, StatsCan says after posting strong growth of 0.8% in the first quarter of 2003, business productivity deteriorated with a decline in the second, almost no increase in the third and then a further 0.3% decline in the fourth quarter. As a result, annual labour productivity growth for 2003 was only 0.1%, the smallest annual increase since the 0.2% drop in 1996.

This compares unfavourably with U.S. productivity, prompting some economists to forecast a further rate cut from the Bank of Canada in the coming months. StatsCan says U.S. quarterly productivity growth slowed in the fourth quarter to 0.5%, down from the 2.1% observed in the third quarter. But despite this slowdown, says Statscan, American businesses recorded strong productivity growth of 4.5% for 2003 overall, similar to the 4.9% posted in 2002. “An increase of this magnitude has not been seen since 1950.”

However, the economic news in the U.S. is not as bright as it might seem. The U.S. Commerce department is reporting that the U.S. current account deficit, a gauge of the nation’s global trade, narrowed unexpectedly in the fourth quarter. The trade gap, which measures goods, services and financial transactions, declined to $127.5 billion from October through December, the Commerce Department said Friday. For all of 2003, the current account deficit expanded to a record $541.8 billion, up from 2002’s $480.9 billion.

A 0.1% increase in U.S. business inventories was smaller than expected, as sales rose. Commerce says inventories edged up 0.1% to $1.194 trillion, after an advance of 0.3% in December. The January increase was smaller than expected. Marketwatchers projected an advance of 0.3%.

Later today the University of Michigan will release its preliminary survey of consumer confidence for March. Economists expect to see a drop to 93.8 from February’s 94.4.

Overseas markets are being affected by fears of al-Qaeda involvement in bombings in Madrid. Tokyo’s Nikkei fell 134.29 points, or 1.19%, to 11,162.75 points, falling more than 1% for the second day in a row. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index fell 91.83 points, or 0.71%, to 12,932.23.

At midday in Europe, Madrid’s Ibex35 Index is down 2.1% at 7,944.8, after opening with deeper losses than expected. The index declined 2.2% Thursday. In Paris, the CAC40 dropped initially but has recovered to 3,625.67. However that’s down 0.6% from Thursday’s close. In Frankfurt, the Xetra DAX Index is down 0.6% at 3,883.20, after falling 3.5% on Thursday. London’s FTSE 100 Index is down 0.1% at 4,443.10, after dropping 2.2% on Thursday.

Toronto’s S&P/TSX composite index finished 81.54 points lower at 8,503.88. The TSX earlier was down as much as 131 points as Nortel Networks shares fell on news of a delay in filing audited financial results.

New York’s Dow average of big industrials took the brunt of losses, losing 168.51 points to 10,128.38 in its second consecutive triple-digit decline. The Nasdaq composite index finished the day down 20.26 points to 1,943.89. The S&P 500 index was down 17.11 at 1,106.78.