The Toronto stock market looked to open lower Thursday amid a strong earnings report from Canadian Pacific Railway and mixed corporate data from the U.S.
The S&P/TSX composite index leaped 145.02 points, or nearly 1%, to close Wednesday at 15,226.34.
The Canadian dollar shed 0.07 cents to 93.02 cents U.S. early Thursday
Canadian Pacific posted second quarter net income of $371 million, or $2.11 per diluted share, up 48% from a year ago and beating estimates by a penny. Revenues were ahead 12% to $1.68 billion while the key operating ratio was 65.1%, a 680-basis point improvement.
In the U.S., Morgan Stanley handily beat profit and revenue estimates for the second quarter. The bank said earnings rose 47% to $1.9 billion U.S., or 94 cents a share. Adjusted per-share earnings came to 91 cents, compared with a FactSet consensus estimate of 55 cents.
Revenue totaled $8.6 billion, compared to $8.52 billion, in the year-ago quarter, and $8.5 billion on an adjusted basis. The FactSet consensus was for revenue of $8.22 billion and the bank’s shares were up 2% in pre-market trading.
Late Wednesday, West Fraser Timber Co. said net income in the latest quarter was $74 million or 87 cents per share, compared with $109 million or $1.27 per share in the comparable 2013 period.
Revenue rose to $1.05 million from $900 million in the second quarter of 2013 and from $809 million in the first quarter of this year as increased shipments in its lumber operations were offset by lower prices.
In other corporate developments, Loblaw Companies says Galen Weston will become president of the retailer as part of broader changes that shake up its management structure.
The move has Weston replacing Vicente Trius effective immediately, with the company saying that Trius plans to return to Brazil for "family reasons."
Weston was formerly executive chairman of the company, which is a longtime family business and a subsidiary of George Weston Ltd. Loblaw posts financial results on July 24.
Elsewhere on the economic front, Statistics Canada reported this morning that foreign investors bought up $21.4 billion of Canadian securities in May, most of them government bonds. Canadian investors added $2.0 billion of foreign securities to their holdings in the month, most of them non-U.S. instruments.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange gained 2.72 points Wednesday to 1,009.29.
ON WALLSTREET
Markets are poised for a pullback Thursday after the Dow Jones industrial average cruised to a new record high.
Ahead of the opening bell, futures for the Dow Jones Industrials dipped 40 points, or 0.2%, to 17,017. Futures for the S&P 500 slid 8.5 points, or 0.4%, to 1,966.25, and futures for the NASDAQ fell 18.75 points, or 0.5%, to 3,903.75
Shares in SanDisk fell nearly 10% pre-market after its quarterly report disappointed investors. Fiat-- owner of Chrysler -- was up nearly 4% in Europe on a report that Volkswagen is thinking about a takeover. VW shares were down 2%.
Earnings season continues, with Morgan Stanley reporting results before the opening bell. The finance firm reported quarterly gains in net income and revenue, compared to the year-earlier quarter.
Shares in the bank were trading up 0.7% pre-market. Google and IBM are slated to report earnings after the close.
The U.S. government is to report weekly jobless claims this morning, as well as the number of housing starts and building permits issued in June at the same time.
A consensus of economists surveyed by Briefing.com projects jobless claims of 311,000 in the week ended July 12. Housing starts are projected to have reached an annualized rate of 1,020,000 in June, while building permits are forecast at an annual rate of 1,037,000 for that period.
Asian markets flopped, led by a 0.6% drop on China's Shanghai Composite. European stocks were also broadly lower in early trading. Russian stocks fell by nearly 3%, and the ruble slipped against the dollar, after the U.S. announced new sanctions related to the crisis in Ukraine.
Oil prices climbed $1.47 to $102.67 U.S. a barrel
Gold prices added one dollar to $1,300.80 U.S. an ounce.
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