European Markets Are Mixed, Asian Markets Closed Way Up

European equities indices are mixed this morning, after a strong night in Asia.

Here's the scorecard, so far:

France's CAC 40 is up 0.19%

Spain's IBEX is down 0.16%

Italy's FTSE MIB is down 1.43%

Britain's FTSE 100 is up 0.43%

Germany's DAX is up 0.65%

Asian markets had a good trading day and closed way up. The Nikkei finished up 1.46%. The Hang Seng closed up 1.27%.

US futures are basically flat: The S&P is up 0.25 points and the Dow is down 13 points.

Mortgage lending figures from the Bank of England are out at 5:30 a.m. ET, which should give some indication of the health of the housing market in September. Analysts are expecting a slight dip.

From the US later, the major scheduled news is the Federal Reserve's announcement on rates and QE at 2 p.m. ET. Most importantly, despite the volatility of recent weeks, they are expected to taper the last of the country's quantitative easing purchases and end QE3.