TSX may open higher, investors eye Italian elections

(Reuters) - Canadian stocks looked set to open higher on Monday, tracking global markets, helped by speculation that the United States and Japan will offer ultra easy monetary policy for some time, but uncertainty about the outcome of the closely-fought election in Italy could keep a lid on gains.

TOP STORIES

* Sales of BlackBerry's make-or-break line of smartphones are running faster than expected, and the company has increased production too keep up, its chief executive said in a newspaper.

* Suncor Energy Inc and Canadian Natural Resources Ltd : Shares of the two companies could gain more than 25 percent in the next year, helped by valuable asset bases that may attract activist investors, Barron's said in its February 25 edition.

* Italians voted for a second and final day in a general election on Monday with a surge in protest votes increasing the risk of an unstable outcome that could undermine Europe's efforts to end its three-year debt crisis.

* Japan's prime minister is likely to nominate an advocate of aggressive monetary easing - Asian Development Bank President Haruhiko Kuroda - as the next central bank governor to step up his fight to finally rid the country of deflation.

* China Petroleum & Chemical Corp (Sinopec), Asia's largest oil refiner, will buy a 50 percent stake in Chesapeake Energy Corp's Mississippi Lime oil and gas properties in Oklahoma and Kansas for $1.02 billion, a Sinopec source said.

(Reporting by Chandrashekhar Modi; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson)