Tuesday looked set to be a quiet day on Wall Street, with stock index futures little changed in the run-up to the opening bell. Just after trading started for the day, the S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) eased lower by about 0.2%.

The consumer economy makes up a huge part of total business activity around the world, and investors in the U.S. have watched closely to see if signs of weakening demand would show up in the businesses that consumers visit most frequently. The latest financial results from Target (NYSE: TGT) presented somewhat of a mixed picture on that front, with solid fundamentals but the prospect of a future slowdown. For Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings (NYSE: NCLH), however, the news wasn't as good, and shareholders saw significant declines in its stock price early Tuesday.

Shares of Target opened higher by about 2% on Tuesday morning. The department store retailer's fiscal fourth-quarter financial report for the period ending Jan. 28 included modest gains but set the stage for a potential slowdown.

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Source Fool.com