Equities in Toronto maintained a positive outlook by early afternoon Wednesday, boosted by gains for its heavyweight financial group, while earnings hits and misses moved a string of companies.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index took on 40.38 points to greet noon at 15,242.48
The Canadian dollar eked up 0.03 cents to 79.71 cents U.S.
The financials group, which accounts for more than a third of the index's weight, gained as shares of Genworth MI Canada Inc jumped 7% to $38.75 after the private-sector residential mortgage insurer reported quarterly earnings that sharply exceeded analyst expectations.
The country's biggest banks were also among the most influential gainers, with Royal Bank of Canada up 0.8% at $94.17 and Toronto-Dominion Bank adding 0.7% to $64.65.
Movie theater chain Cineplex fell 9.1% to $44.98 after reporting a big profit miss, hurt by higher costs and lower attendance.
CGI Group fell 4.1% to $63.63 after the IT services company missed profit estimates on lower margins and bookings as well as weakness in its European business.
Torstar Corp lost 1.4% to $1.43 after the newspaper publisher posted a surprise quarterly loss.
Top gainers included oil services company Gibson Energy, which jumped 9.5% to $17.87 after saying it planned to sell its U.S. environmental services business. Analysts said that could raise between $90 million and $120 million that could be used to pay down debt.
Restaurant Brands International fell 0.8% to $73.66 as higher revenue at its Burger King group was offset by weakness in comparable sales growth at its Tim Horton coffee and donut chain.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange acquired 2.4 points to 770.43
Seven of the 12 TSX subgroups were higher midday, with consumer staples soaring 1%, with utilities and gold each improving 0.5%.
The five laggards were weighed most by information technology, slumping 1.3%, health-care, ailing 0.8%, and industrials, tailing off 0.2%.
ON WALLSTREET
The Dow Jones Industrial Average notched another milestone on Wednesday, but then slid a mite below the historic 22,000 level.
The Dow was better by 27.95 points to 22,011.37, reaching the record with a boost from Apple's stock, which surged nearly 4% after posting quarterly results that blew expectations out of the water.
The company reported earnings per share of $1.67 on revenue of $45.4 billion. Analysts expected earnings per share of $1.57 on revenue of $44.89 billion.
It took the Dow just over five months to surge to 22,000 from 21,000. Boeing shares have had the biggest point impact on the price-weighted Dow, contributing 380.29 points since March 1, followed by McDonald's and UnitedHealth Group with 171.14 and 166.35 points, respectively.
The S&P 500 dipped 6.23 points to 2,470.12
The NASDAQ faded 28.26 points to 6,334.68
Shares of Amazon, Google-parent Alphabet and Netflix followed Apple higher
Wall Street also set its sights on key economic data. Private U.S. companies added 178,000 jobs last month, according to a report from ADP and Moody's Analytics. But economists expected an increase of 185,000 jobs.
Prices for the benchmark 10-year Treasury note gained slightly, lowering yields to 2.25% from Tuesday’s 2.26%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices gained 34 cents to $49.50 U.S. a barrel
Gold prices slid $1.40 to $1,278.00 U.S. an ounce.
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