Toronto stocks charged ahead to end an eventful week, mostly on the backs of gold stocks.
The big board in New York was in negative country, though some indexes saw the light of day
By the closing bell on Friday, the S&P/TSX Composite Index had climbed 141.1 points to 8,628.0
On the economic front, the cost of living in Canada fell to the lowest level in two years last month as falling energy prices continued to drive annual inflation closer to zero, as a result, the Canadian dollar rose 1.23 cents to 81.05 cents U.S.
Statistics Canada says annual inflation dipped to 1.2% in December, a level not seen since January 2007, and almost a full point below November's 2% rate. The Bank of Canada expects annual core inflation to eventually dip as low as 1.1%, but not to fall into negative territory.
The central bank does, however, see a contraction in total annual inflation later this year - a contraction that will last for two quarters, but which it does not consider deflationary because it stems mainly from falling energy prices.
Canadian National Railway rose $1.64 to $41.59 after it raised its dividend by 10%. CN's fourth-quarter profit of $573 million was down from a year ago, but this was mainly because of big gains in the year-earlier period, and the result beat market expectations.
The TSX gold sector powered much of this ebullience, Goldcorp Inc. gaining $2.13 to $35.40.
HudBay Minerals Inc. surged 25% to $4.40 after the Ontario Securities Commission ruled its shareholders must be allowed to vote on its proposed highly dilutive all-stock takeover of Lundin Mining Corp., whose shares dropped 21% to 94 cents.
BAYSTREET
Seven of the 13 TSX sub-groups were still down, information technology the main laggard, off 1.35%, followed by utilities, down 1%, financials off 0.9%
Gold led the six sub-groups in the gravy Friday, ahead 7.1%, followed by a 5.8% surge for materials, and a 3.3% jump for energy stocks.
The TSX Venture Exchange advanced 9.48 points to 852.99, while the NASDAQ Canada index gained 2.24 points to 521.45
ON WALLSTREET
The Dow Jones industrial was off 45.2 points to end the week at 8077.56. The Standard & Poor's 500 index gained back 4.48 points from Thursday to 831.95. The Nasdaq composite had a respectable increase of 11.8 points to 1477.29, on the strength of Google.
Investors continue to focus their attention on GE, which missed expectations on its quarterly results.
The company reported fourth-quarter earnings of 36 cents per share attributable to common shareholders, down from 68 cents a year ago, and revenue of $46.2 billion.
Analysts were expecting GE to post earnings of 37 cents per share and revenue of $50 billion, according to a consensus of opinion compiled by Thomson Reuters. Shares fell 4% at the open.
Among tech issues, Google reported late Thursday that its fourth-quarter net income tumbled 68% to $382 million. However, excluding certain charges, the company earned $5.10 a share, better than consensus estimates of $4.95 per share. Shares were little changed in morning trading.
Among drug firms, stocks to watch included Pfizer and Wyeth. The Wall Street Journal reported that Pfizer is in talks to acquire the rival drugmaker in a deal that could be worth more than $60 billion.
Treasury prices slipped, raising the yield on the benchmark 10-year note to 2.61% from 2.59% Thursday. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions. Yields on the 2-year, 10-year and 30-year Treasurys all hit record lows last month.
U.S. light crude oil for March delivery rose $2.80 to settle at $46.47 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
COMEX gold for April delivery rose $37.20 to settle at $897.70 an ounce.
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