NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - Stocks were poised to open higher Tuesday on positive earnings news, despite signs of a slowdown in home building and as oil prices continued to flirt with record prices.

Still U.S. stock futures were up in early trading, indicating a higher open for U.S. markets when compared to fair value, even though oil prices rose from the record close reached Monday.

The May light crude futures contract for NYMEX rose 38 cents to $70.78 a barrel in electronic trading, while the June contract for Brent crude gained 36 cents higher to $71.90.

Peter Cardillo, chief market strategist SW Bach, said that stock futures were being helped by a generally positive earnings report, including better-than-expected results at Wall Street broker Merrill Lynch (Research).

Johnson & Johnson also reported Tuesday that its first-quarter earnings rose to $3.3 billion, helped by a fee from the failed Guidant deal and higher medical device sales.

"Earnings reports should continue to be good, but in the short terms the market will remain in captivity to higher oil and commodity prices," he said. He said the markets could get a lift from the economic reports due Tuesday before the markets open.

Investors were also forced to digest a pair of economic reports on housing starts and building permits and wholesale inflation.

The Census Bureau reported that builders started fewer homes in March than they did in February, hinting at a weaker real estate market. Housing starts slumped to an annual rate of 1.96 million in March, compared to a revised 2.13 million pace in February.

Building permits, which are generally seen as a barometer of builder confidence in the market, fell to an annual rate of 2.06 million from 2.18 million in February.

Housing starts were forecast to be down to an annual rate of 2.03 million in March from 2.12 million in the latest sign of a cooling housing market, according to Briefing.com, while permits, seen as a measure of builder confidence in the market, it expected to fall to 2.1 million from 2.18 million the previous month.

The government also reported that U.S. producer prices climbed 0.5 percent in March, hurt by rising energy prices. But core-PPI, which strips out food and energy, only rose 0.1 percent, its smallest gain in four months.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com expect the Producer Price Index to show a 0.4 percent rise in March, following a 1.4 percent decline in February on lower energy prices that month. The so called core-PPI, which excludes often volatile food and energy prices, was expected to be up 0.2 percent, compared to a 0.3 percent gain in February.

Also in economic news, at 2 p.m. the Federal Reserve will release the minutes of its most recent meeting, the first chaired by Ben Bernanke.

Major markets in Asia closed higher Tuesday, while major European markets were mixed in early trading.

Treasury prices were up slightly, leaving the yield on the benchmark 10-year note just below the 5 percent level reached late Monday. The dollar was higher against both the euro and yen.

Earnings reports due Tuesday include four bellwether tech companies -- computer maker IBM (Research), cell phone maker Motorola (Research), Internet firm Yahoo! (Research) and chip maker Texas Instruments (Research), which are all due to report after the market close.

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