Equities in Canada’s largest centre ended the first session of the week on a positive note, as health-care and real-estate surmounted any negative vibes created by gold and consumer staples.
The TSX gained 62.06 points to close Monday at 20,641.97.
The Canadian dollar slid 0.16 cents to 74.66 cents U.S.
Health-care led the festivities, with Canopy Growth picking up nine cents, or 4.7%, to $2.00, while Tilray tacked on 17 cents, or 5.4%, to $4.34.
Real-estate was next, with Northwest Health-care Properties REIT units collecting 24 cents, or 3%, to $8.34, while H&R REIT grew 26 cents, or 2.1%, to $12.43.
In techs, Shopify sprouted wings and flew $3.12, or 1.5%, to $65.11, and Lightspeed Commerce jumped 20 cents, or 1.1%, to $19.08.
Gold put a damper on things, though, as Centerra Gold sank 41 cents, or 4%, to $9.74, while NewGold dropped 43 cents, or 5.2%, to $7.90.
In consumer staples, Alimentation Couche-Tard gave back $1.16, or 1.7%, to $66.79, while Loblaw dipped $1.85, or 1.5%, to $124.31.
In utilities, Algonquin Power & Utilities docked 19 cents, or 1.7%, to $11.35, while Transalta dropped 16 cents, or 1.3%, to $12.15.
On the economic calendar, Statistics Canada reported foreign investment in Canadian securities totaled $4.6 billion in February, led by acquisitions of corporate bonds. Meanwhile, Canadian investors reduced their exposure to foreign securities by $1.6 billion, a third consecutive month of divestment., while wholesale sales declined 1.7% to $85.6 billion in February. Decreased sales in the motor vehicle and motor vehicle parts and accessories and the food, beverage and tobacco subsectors led the decline.
The Canadian Real Estate Association noted national home sales rose 1.4% month-over-month in March. Actual (not seasonally adjusted) monthly activity came in 34.4% below March 2022.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange settled 6.19 points to finish at 631.69.
The 12 TSX subgroups were evenly divided, with health-care soaring 2.8%, real-estate strengthened 1.2%, and information technology picked up 0.5%.
The half-dozen laggards were weighed most by gold, down 1.8%, consumer staples sagging 0.8%, and utilities, off 0.3%.
ON WALLSTREET
The S&P 500 rose Monday as traders combed through the latest batch of corporate earnings results, searching for clues on the health of corporate America.
The Dow Jones Industrials recovered from its losses and vaulted 100.71 points to end the week’s first session at 33,987.18.
The much broader index regained 13.68 points Monday to 4,151.32.
The NASDAQ soared 34.26 points to 12,157.72.
Earnings season pressed on with results from State Street and Charles Schwab before the bell. Schwab shares, which have come under pressure amid fears that the brokerage firm may suffer a similar fate to Silicon Valley Bank, rose 3.9% on a profit beat despite a decline in deposits. State Street fell 9.2% after missing estimates on the top and bottom lines.
Wall Street is closely monitoring the health of financial names this earnings period after Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse last month spurred a liquidity crisis and rocked the broader sector.
Elsewhere, the S&P’s communication services sector slumped 1.3%, led to the downside by declines from tech giants Alphabet, Netflix and Meta Platforms. The Google parent company fell 2.8% as The New York Times reported that Samsung is weighing making Bing its default search engine.
Corporate earnings got off to a positive start last week as banking giants Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase beat expectations. The findings seemed to suggest that behemoths are holding up against mounting recession fears.
The reporting period for financial companies presses on with results from Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. Outside of financials, reports from electric vehicle heavyweight Tesla, IBM and Netflix are also due out.
Prices for the 10-year Treasury docked some of their strength, raising yields to 3.60% from Friday’s 3.51%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices sank $1.57 to $80.95 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices backtracked $7.50 to $2,008.30 U.S. an ounce.
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