US Stock Futures Point To Lower Open; Quarterly Earnings, Data On Inflation And Housing, And Janet Yellen's Speech Should Influence Markets

Following Monday's gains, which came after a rough, rocky week for U.S. stocks, investors will look to earnings announcements from retail, banking and technology majors, plus data on inflation and housing, and a speech from Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen for direction.

Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average were down 0.17 percent while futures on the S&P 500 were down 0.12 percent and those on the Nasdaq were down 0.12 percent. On Monday, the Dow rose 0.91 percent and the S&P 500 climbed 0.82 percent while the Nasdaq gained 0.57 percent.

Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ), Northern Trust Corp. (NASDAQ:NTRS) and The Coca-Cola Co. (NYSE:KO) are scheduled to announce quarterly earnings before markets open while CSX Corp. (NYSE:CSX), Intel Corp. (NASDAQ:INTC) and Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) are among those slated to do so after market hours.

On the data front, the consumer price index for March will be released at 8:30 a.m. EDT while the National Association of Home Builders' housing market index for April will be released at 10 a.m. A speech from Yellen, to be delivered at a Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta conference, is slated for 8:45 a.m.

In Europe, markets were down with the Stoxx Europe 600 index falling 0.6 percent while the FTSE 100 was down 0.44 percent. Germany’s DAX-30 fell 0.99 percent while France's CAC-40 was down 0.55 percent.

In Asia, Japan's Nikkei-225 gained 0.62 percent while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.55 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1.6 percent and the Shanghai Composite was down 1.41 percent. South Korea’s Kospi slipped 0.24 percent, while India's BSE Sensex was trading down 0.72 percent.