Equities in Canada’s largest centre made modest gains in early trade on Monday, with most sectors rising and subdued declines in the heavyweight energy group despite the failure of a weekend meeting of oil-producing countries to agree an output freeze.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index turned positive 69.06 points to move into noon hour at 13,706.26
The Canadian dollar gained 0.01 cents to 78.04 cents U.S.
Pipeline operators gained, with TransCanada Corp up 0.8% to $50.66 and Enbridge advancing 0.7% to $52.34.
Other laggards on the index included CI Financial Corp, which declined 3.9% to $27.9. Major oil producer Suncor Energy Inc fell 0.4% to $35.77.
Gold miners also slipped, with Detour Gold Corp down 4% to $24.75 and Goldcorp Inc off 1.4%.
Base metal miners gained, with Teck Resources rising 2.4% to $11.16 and First Quantum Minerals Ltd added 3.2% to $7.37.
On the economic slate, Statistics Canada reported that foreign investment in Canadian securities reached $15.9 billion in February, mostly Canadian-dollar-denominated instruments.
At the same time, Canadian investors kept buying foreign securities by adding $4.4 billion to their holdings, following a $14.7-billion divestment in January.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange added 4.56 points to 638.40
All but three of the 13 TSX subgroups stayed up by noon hour, with metals and mining galloping 6.1%, health-care issues up 1.6%, and energy growing stronger 1.2%
The two laggards were gold, down 0.2%, and consumer staples, off 0.01%. Telecoms were unchanged by midday.
ON WALLSTREET
U.S. stocks traded higher Monday, with consumer discretionary and health-care stocks among the top gainers, as oil prices pared most of their overnight losses.
The Dow Jones Industrials strengthened 75.81 points to 17,973.27, with Disney leading advancers and Apple the greatest decliner.
The S&P 500 gained 8.29 points to 2,089.02. Energy recovered an initial 1% decline to trade more than 1% higher as the top S&P 500 performer in late-morning trade. The Dow and S&P 500 are trading near their highest levels of the year so far.
The NASDAQ index gained 9.77 points to 4,947.99,
Shares of Walt Disney briefly rose 2.5% to contribute the most the gains in the Dow, while Apple contributed the most to declines.
Pivotal Research upgraded Disney to "buy" from "hold," saying many investor concerns are already priced into the stock. Separately, Disney's "The Jungle Book" won the weekend box office by a wide margin, taking in $103.6 million U.S. in North American ticket sales and ranking as the second best ever April opening.
Hasbro traded more than 5% higher after beating estimates by 14 cents with quarterly profit of 38 cents U.S. per share, while revenue topped analyst forecasts by a wide margin as well. Hasbro's results were powered by toys based on "Star Wars: The Force Awakens."
Shares of Hasbro and Mattel both hit fresh 52-week highs in morning trade.
Morgan Stanley posted better-than-expected earnings per share with revenue coming in roughly in line. IBM and Netflix are set to report after the close.
Major oil producers met on Sunday in Doha, Qatar, and lack of agreement initially sent oil prices sharply lower.
However, oil traded well off lows touched overnight. On Sunday, according to Reuters, Kuwait reduced its crude oil output and refining production as part of an emergency plan to help the OPEC member deal with the largest petroleum workers' strike in years.
The news wire also cited a tweet from Kuwait Oil Company's account that said the company had cut crude output to 1.1 million barrels per day from its normal production level of about three million barrels a day.
Economically speaking, the NAHB housing index was reported ahead of schedule, with the housing market index at 58 in April, unchanged from March.
Prices for the 10-year Treasury fell back, sending yields up to 1.78% from Friday’s 1.75%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices dipped 48 cents a barrel to $39.88 U.S.
Gold prices lost $1.04 to $1,232.95 U.S. an ounce.
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