TORONTO - The Toronto stock market headed for a lower open Tuesday as traders awaited the release of some key U.S. economic data during the morning.

The Canadian dollar was little changed, down 0.01 of a cent to 93.22 cents US amid rising prices for oil and gold.

U.S. futures were in the red with the Dow Jones industrial futures down 18 points to 16,822, the Nasdaq futures declined 1.7 points to 3,792.8 and the S&P 500 futures were off 3.25 points to 1,949.75.

Traders will digest the latest data on house prices from S&P/Case-Shiller and the Federal Housing Finance Agency for April.

And the U.S. Commerce Department is expected to report that new home sales increased to 440,000 in May. In April, the annual rate of new single-family home sales rose 6.4 per cent to 433,000.

Also, the New York-based Conference Board releases its June reading on consumer confidence. The index is expected to edge up to 83.5 from 83 in May.

Oil prices ticked higher with the August crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange up 16 cents to US$106.33 a barrel.

Oil prices had risen steadily over the past couple of weeks amid a rising insurgency in Iraq. But prices had fallen on Monday as fears receded that it would greatly affect its oil production and exports.

The bulk of Iraq’s production and export operations are in the south, which have so far been spared in this month’s advance by the al-Qaeda inspired group.

OPEC Secretary General Abdullah Al-Badry said Tuesday that Iraq is "still producing as normal," with 95 per cent of its capacity in the country’s south being unaffected by the violence.

Gold prices have also steadily advanced this month because of geopolitical worries centred around Iraq and tensions between Ukraine and Russia and on Tuesday, the August bullion contract in New York rose $6.40 to US$1,324.80 an ounce.

Copper was unchanged at US$3.15 a pound following a three-cent rise Monday sparked by strong Chinese data.

The TSX closed little changed Monday amid data showing the Chinese manufacturing sector moved into positive territory during June for the first time since December along with strong U.S. manufacturing and housing sales data. The Toronto market is a handful of points away from last Thursday's record close that left the TSX up more than 10 per cent year to date.

On the corporate front, Bell Media, the radio and television division of BCE Inc. (TSX:BCE), is laying off as many as 120 jobs or about five per cent of its Toronto workforce due to “financial pressure” in its advertising and subscription TV services. Bell Media runs a variety of television channels like the CTV network, CTV Two and the TSN sports lineup. Its speciality channels include The Comedy Network, the MuchMusic channels and MTV.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2014