Equity markets in Canada’s largest centre traded flat on Wednesday, as losses in heavyweight mining and utilities stocks outweighed optimism over a quick economic recovery after Britain approved a COVID-19 vaccine.
The TSX recovered 42.38 points to break for lunch Wednesday at 17,339.31.
The Canadian dollar faded 0.04 cents to 77.28 cents U.S.
Britain on Wednesday became the first country in the world to approve the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for use, saying it would start rolling it out early next week.
Royal Bank lost 59 cents to $106.45, and National Bank dipped 76 cents, or 1%, to $72.67, as the two major banks beat expectations for fourth-quarter profit on lower-than-expected provisions to cover potential loan losses.
The largest percentage gainers on the TSX were Blackberry which jumped $1.17, or 12.9%, to $10.25, adding to more than 19% rally
on Tuesday and Lightspeed Pos, which rose $6.36, or 9.4%, to $74.36, after brokerages raised their price targets on the stock.
Methanex fell $1.30, or 2.4%, the most on the TSX, to $53.50. The second-biggest decliner was Firstservice Corp, down $6.20, or 3.4%, to $174.92
Economically speaking, Canadian labour productivity fell by a record 10.3% in the third quarter as hours worked rebounded faster than business output.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange gained 5.64 points midday to 762.75.
Seven of the 12 TSX subgroups were higher by noon hour, led by energy, gushing 3.9%, health-care, haler by 3.2%, and information technology, clicking 1% higher.
The four laggards were weighed most by utilities, down 1.1%, real-estate, off 0.8%, and gold, dulling 0.5%.
Industrials were unchanged by noon EST.
ON WALLSTREET
U.S. stocks were little changed on Wednesday, taking a breather following a strong start to the month that lifted the S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite to record highs in the previous session.
The Dow Jones Industrials reached noon up 3.15 points to 29,827.07. Dow component Salesforce announced it is acquiring messaging platform Slack for $27.7 billion after the bell on Tuesday. The Slack deal marks the cloud software vendor’s largest deal ever. Shares of Salesforce were off 7%.
The S&P 500 forged ahead 3.43 points on top of Tuesday’s closing high at 3,665.88.
The NASDAQ dropped 10.04 points from Tuesday’s all-time closing peak to 12,345.07.
That decline was offset by gains in bank and energy names. Chevron was the best-performing stock in the Dow, rising 3.8%. JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs each advanced more than 1%.
Investors digested more positive Covid-19 vaccine news on Wednesday. The UK authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for use, marking another step in the global battle against the pandemic.
Wednesday’s losses came after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell rejected a bipartisan proposal for a $908-billion stimulus package aimed at breaking the stalemate over new stimulus in Congress.
Equities were also under pressure after President-elect Joe Biden told The New York Times he would not immediately remove tariffs placed by the Trump administration targeting China.
Despite the positive vaccine data, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell called the economic outlook "extraordinarily uncertain" on Tuesday when he and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin spoke before Congress this week as part of mandated updates on CARES Act funding. Mnuchin did call on Congress for $300 billion in aid for restaurants heading into the winter months.
On the data front, private payrolls rose by 307,000 in November, according to ADP. Economists polled by Dow Jones are expecting 475,000 private jobs were added in November, compared to the 365,000 added in October. The number was also the lowest since July. ADP’s report comes days ahead of the U.S. Labor Department’s monthly jobs report.
Prices for the 10-Year Treasury retreated, pushing yields up to 0.95% from Tuesday’s 0.92%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices acquired 93 cents to $45.48 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices rose $12.90 to $1,831.80 U.S.
