Canada's main stock index ?edged lower on Thursday, as market participants remained cautious amid uncertainty in the Middle East conflict and assessed a fresh batch of quarterly bank earnings.
The TSX remained negative 53.33 points to 36,760.32
The Canadian dollar poked up 0.09 cents to 72.16 cents U.S.
Investors assessed quarterly bank earnings from Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and Royal Bank of Canada, alongside the ongoing geopolitical uncertainty.
CIBC shares slid $5.87, or 3.6%, to $157.95, while those for RBC cratered $6.45, or 2.2%, to $281.66.
Information technology shares were lifted by a jump of 70 cents, or 6.5%, in BlackBerry to $11.50.
On the geopolitical front, Qatar's prime minister will visit Tehran on Thursday to pursue mediation efforts after the U.S. and Iran traded recriminations over Washington's promise to increase economic pressure on Iran by targeting its trade partners for sanctions.
On the economic front, Statistics Canada reported the number of employees receiving pay and benefits from their employer—measured as "payroll employment" in the Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours—was little changed (+4,800; +0.0%) in June, following an increase of 45,000 (+0.2%) in May. On a year-on-year basis, payroll employment was up by 155,000 (+0.8%) in June.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange dipped 1.58 points to 1,001.19.
Seven of the 12 TSX subgroups were still lower midday, weighed most by health-care, sliding 1.4%, utilities, backing off 1.1%, and financials, ducking 0.9%.
The five gainers were led by information technology, sprinting 2.7%, gold, up 0.9%, and materials, ahead 0.8%.
ON WALLSTREET
The NASDAQ Composite was higher on Thursday as the latest earnings reports from Nvidia and other well-known technology companies boosted sentiment.
The Dow Jones Industrials pulled out of negative country and gained 140.37 points to 53,604.25.
The S&P 500 recovered 49.29 points to 7,724.99.
The NASDAQ Composite rocketed 344.07 points, or 1.3%, to 26,474.26.
Nvidia shares jumped 8% after it beat analyst expectations and forecast strong revenue growth. Notably, the chipmaker is projected to see revenue growth hit 70% in fiscal 2028, far higher than the 44% that analysts expected. Its revenue for the fiscal second quarter more than doubled.
Shares linked to the semiconductor industry rallied, with Broadcom adding 3%, and SK Hynix tacking on 2% and Intel up 3%.
Outside of Nvidia and its fellow chip stocks, Salesforce rallied 18% after revenue came in ahead of Wall Street’s forecast for the second quarter. Software stocks such as Adobe and Autodesk climbed around 5% each.
Within cybersecurity specifically, Okta soared more than 26% and CrowdStrike gained 17% after surpassing analyst expectations and raising their outlooks as the companies see booming demand due to agentic AI.
Other cyber stocks such as Palo Alto Networks rose alongside them. That stock in particular popped 11%.
Prices for the 10-year Treasury were lower, raising yields to 4.66% from Wednesday’s 4.63%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices took on 26 cents to $82.49 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices revived six dollars to $4,659.30 U.S. an ounce.
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