Canada's main stock index struggled to find direction on Friday, poised for modest weekly losses, while investors reduced their rate cut expectations following a surprisingly strong employment report.
The TSX collapsed 200.91 points at noon EDT to 30,060.07. On the week so far, the index has shed 402 points, or 1.3%,
The Canadian dollar gained 0.09 cents at 71.42 cents.
Markets in Canada will be closed Monday for Thanksgiving.
In corporate news, JPMorgan upgraded mining company First Quantum Minerals' rating to 'overweight' from 'neutral'. Shares in First Quantum dropped 27 cents to $32.26.
Aritzia surged $7.70, or 9.7%, to $87.24, an all-time high after reporting quarterly revenue above estimates.
Statistics Canada reported Friday the economy created 60,000 jobs during September, keeping the unemployment rate at 7.1%.
Traders are leaning toward an interest rate cut at the BoC's next policy announcement on October 29, after the central bank cut rates last month for the first time since March to support the economy.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange gained 5.36 points to 999.63.
Seven of the 12 TSX subgroups were lower, with health-care failing 2.8%, energy down 2.2%, and information technology off 2.2%.
The five gainers were led by telecoms, up 0.8%, utilities, ahead 0.5%, and gold, shinier 0.4%.
ON WALLSTREET
Stocks moved decidedly lower in a rapid move on Friday after President Donald Trump threatened higher tariffs on China, accusing the country of ‘becoming very hostile’ with its restrictions on rare earth metals, a key resource for the tech and defense industries.
The Dow Jones Industrial Index jumped 181.59 points to begin Friday’s session at 46,540.01.
The much broader index recovered 17.41 points to 6,752.52
The tech-heavy NASDAQ grew 59.92 points to 23,084.54.
Prior to Trump’s comments, stocks were sizably higher, with the NASDAQ hitting a new all-time intraday high.
Shares of tech stocks with the most to lose from souring trade relations with China led the rapid selloff Friday. Nvidia lost more than 1%, while AMD dropped more than 5% and Tesla shed almost 3%.
Trump accused China of holding the globe “captive” using its rare earths metals resources. Earlier this week, China tightened their control on the market requiring foreign entities to get a license from Beijing to export anything that contains rare earths worth 0.1% or more of the value of the goods.
The U.S. government shutdown dragged into its 10th day on Friday, a day after the Senate failed for a seventh time to pass dueling stop-gap funding proposals that would have put an end to the stoppage.
At this point, there have been no signs that Republicans and Democrats have made meaningful progress on negotiations.
With the stalemate continuing, investors are struggling to find catalysts due to a lack of economic data from the government. However, the latest data from the University of Michigan showed that both the U.S. economy and the consumer are holding up.
Also offering some sense of consumer demand, earnings reports on Thursday from companies like Delta Air Lines and PepsiCo were positive, even though they weren’t enough to sustain a rally in stocks that day.
Still, the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ could eke out gains for the week of 0.5% and more than 1%, respectively. The 30-stock Dow, however, is pacing for a 0.5% drop.
Earnings season is set to begin in earnest next week, with several banks such as Citigroup and JPMorgan slated to post their third-quarter results.
Prices for the 10-year Treasury regained lost ground, lowering yields to 4.07% from Thursday’s 4.14%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices deleted $2.58 to $58.93 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices jumped $26.40 to $3,999 U.S. an ounce.
