Equities in Toronto surrendered much of their hard-earned gains by Thursday’s close, as health-care stocks took a header, to counter gains by energy issues.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index stumbled 15.84 points to end Thursday at 15,508.17
The Canadian dollar fell 0.11 cents to 78.64 cents U.S.
Health-care let much of the side down, with Canopy Growth faltering 45 cents, or 1.6%, to $28.29, while Valeant Pharmaceuticals slipped 39 cents, or 1.7%, to $23.21.
Among consumer staples, Loblaw declined $1.16, or 1.8%, to $64.15 a share following its quarterly report. Colabor Group tumbled seven cents, or 9.9%, to 64 cents.
Gold stocks also lost some of their luster, with Golden Queen Mining giving back a penny, or 5.9%, to 16 cents, while Barrick Gold declined 17 cents, or 1.1%, to $15.89.
Energy stocks moved into positive range, with Suncor picking up 31 cents, to $43.18, while Imperial Oil surged 11 cents to $34.39.
Among resource stocks, Teck Resources took on 22 cents to $37.12, while Nautilus Minerals gained five cents, or 17.3%, to 31 cents.
Among industrials, Bombardier moved ahead seven cents, or 1.8%, to $3.92.
On the economic beat, Statistics Canada announced retail sales decreased 0.8% in December to $49.6 billion, after three straight monthly hikes.
Despite this decline, the agency adds, retail sales were up 1.5% in the fourth quarter and up 6.7% for the year.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange managed to forge ahead 1.12 points to 829.19
All but three of the 12 TSX subgroups finished red, as health-care stocks slumped 1.5%, consumer staples slouched 0.8%, and gold dulled in price 0.5%.
The three gainers were energy, up 0.9%, materials, ahead 0.4%, and industrials, stronger by 0.2%.
ON WALLSTREET
The NASDAQ composite closed lower for a fourth straight day on Thursday, notching its longest losing streak since November 2016. The
Dow Jones industrial average and S&P 500 snapped a two-day slide, but closed well off the highs as worries about rising rates lingered.
The Dow came off its nosebleed highs of the day, but still gained 164.17 points, to close at 24,962.48, with United Technologies as its best-performing stock.
The S&P 500 inched up 2.63 points to 2,703.96, after a rollover in the final hour of trading.
The NASDAQ fell 8.14 points to 7,210.09. At its session high, it rose as much as 0.9%. But declines in Netflix and Google-parent Alphabet pressured the index lower.
In corporate news, Chesapeake Energy shares jumped 21.7% after the company reported better-than-expected quarterly earnings. The stock was also the best performer in the S&P 500.
Meanwhile, Roku's stock shed 17.7% after the streaming company issued weaker-than-expected revenue guidance for the current quarter.
Earlier this month, stocks suffered their first 10% pullback since early 2016. The Dow, S&P 500 and NASDAQ all closed in correction territory on Feb. 8. The move lower was sparked, in part, by fears of rising inflation and higher interest rates.
But the major averages were quick to recover some of those losses. As of Wednesday's close, the NASDAQ had regained about 62% of the losses suffered, while the S&P 500 and Dow had jumped about 40% and 35%.
Prices for the benchmark 10-year Treasury note were lower, raising yields to 2.92% from Wednesday’s 2.95%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices gained 98 cents a barrel to $62.66 U.S.
Gold prices regained $1.10 to $1,333.20 U.S. an ounce.
