U.S. stock index futures were lower Monday ahead of a busy week of earnings reports and as Apple shares were hit by demand worries.
Apple fell amid news that the company cut orders for parts on its troubled iPhone 5 due to weak demand. Shares dipped below $500 in pre-market trading, a level the company hasn't traded below since last February.
While there are no major economic reports due Monday, several members of the Federal Reserve are scheduled to speak.
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke will speak at 4 pm ET, in his first speech since the Fed's meeting minutes indicated that some policymakers wanted to end the bond buying program before year end.
San Francisco Fed President John Williams and Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart will also speak throughout the day.
Earlier, Chicago Fed President Charles Evans gave an upbeat outlook for the economy in 2013. Evans forecast the U.S. will grow by 2.5 percent in 2013 and 3.5 percent in 2014. The speech was his first since mid-2011 in which he did not make an explicit call for further monetary easing. Evans was less sanguine on unemployment however, forecasting a rate of 7.4 percent in 2013, easing slightly to 7 percent in 2014.
European and Asian shares posted modest gains. In China, a top securities regulator said Beijing could significantly increase its maximum quota for foreign investors investing in mainland China.
Fourth-quarter earnings will kick off in earnest later this week when most major banks including Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America will report results. (Read More: Bank Earnings: What to Watch For)
Among techs, Hewlett-Packard edged higher after after JPMorgan upgraded its rating on the tech company to "neutral" from "underweight" and raised its price target to $21 from $15.
Cisco Systems rose after R.W. Baird boosted the company to "outperform" from "neutral," saying the company is executing very well in a challenging macroeconomic environment.
And Facebook gained after Deutsche Bank lifted its rating on the social-networking giant to "buy" from "hold," saying mobile newsfeed ads are providing the company with more revenue momentum than any other firms the brokerage covers.
—By CNBC's JeeYeon Park (Follow JeeYeon on Twitter: @JeeYeonParkCNBC)
Coming Up This Week:
MONDAY: Fed's Williams speaks, Fed's Lockhart speaks, Bernanke speaks
TUESDAY: PPI, retail sales, Empire state mfg survey, Fed's Rosengren speaks, Fed's Kocherlakota speaks, business inventories, Fed's Plosser speaks, credit card default rates reported, Facebook event; Earnings from Lennar
WEDNESDAY: Weekly mortgage applications, CPI, Treasury int'l capital, industrial production, housing market index, Fed's Kocherlakota speaks, oil inventories, Beige Book, Fed's Fisher speaks, OPEC's monthly market report; Earnings from Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Bank of NY Mellon, Ebay
THURSDAY: Housing starts, jobless claims, Philadelphia Fed survey, natural gas inventories, Fed's Lockhart speaks, Fed balance sheet, money supply; Earnings from Bank of America, Citigroup, UnitedHealth, BB&T, BlackRock, American Express, Intel, Capital One
FRIDAY: General Electric, Schlumberger, Morgan Stanley
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