Stocks in Canada’s largest market opened little changed on Tuesday, helped by gold miners and marijuana companies while financial stocks and energy companies weighed.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index hesitated 21.41 points from Friday’s close to begin the day, week, month and year at 16,187.72
The Canadian dollar regained 0.15 cents to 79.8 cents U.S.
Among health-care stocks, whose resurgence continued, Valeant Pharmaceuticals picked up 45 cents, or 1.7%, to $26.65.
Gold was another gainer, as Goldcorp collected 15 cents to $16.18.
Telecoms wilted, however, as Shaw Communications fell a penny to $28.68.
Tech stocks such as Constellation Software weakened $1.50 to $760.52.
Economically speaking, the seasonally-adjusted IHS Markit Canada Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index pointed to the strongest improvement in business conditions since September, leaping to 54.7, from 54.4 in November. The headline index has posted above the 50.0 no-change threshold in each month since March 2016.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange moved 6.71 points higher Tuesday to 857.43
All but three of the 12 TSX subgroups were lower, as telecoms slid 0.4%, while information technology and consumer staples each dropped 0.3%.
The gainers were health-care, zooming 2.4%, gold, better by 1.1%, and materials, improving 0.7%.
ON WALLSTREET
U.S. stocks kicked off the New Year on a high note on Tuesday as Wall Street bet on another strong year for equities.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average leaped 107.28 points to begin 2018 at 24,826.50, with Disney shares climbing 1.4%.
The S&P 500 improved 14.23 points to 2,688.14, with consumer discretionary and tech as the best-performing sectors.
The NASDAQ composite index gained 65.11 points to 6,968.50
Disney's stock rose after Macquarie upgraded it to outperform from neutral, pointing out the company's "distribution leverage and optionality, concentration of valuable IP, which will only grow with the Fox acquisition, and continued theatrical momentum."
Disney's "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" remained atop the weekend box office, raking in $68.4 million in North American ticket sales.
Prices for the benchmark 10-year Treasury note skidded, raising yields to 2.45% from Friday’s 2.41%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices gave back 10 cents a barrel to $60.32 U.S.
Gold prices spiked $5.40 to $1,314.70 U.S. an ounce.
