Equities in Canada’s largest centre opened lower on Friday, led by losses in rate-sensitive technology stocks, after stronger-than-expected U.S. producer price data fretted investors over sticky inflation in the world's largest economy.
The TSX demurred 4.38 points to begin Friday at 20,338.56.
The Canadian dollar shied away 0.05 cents to 74.30 cents U.S.
Among company earnings, Air Canada reported a quarterly profit compared with a year-ago loss. Shares in “The Maple Leaf Airline” backed off 15 cents to $22.71.
Satellite operator Telesat said space technology company MDA would build 198 advanced satellites for the company's Lightspeed low earth orbit program for $2.1 billion. Telesat shares rocketed $5.87, or 51.5%, to $17.26.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange slid 1.17 points to 604.49.
The 12 TSX subgroups were evenly divided in the first hour of trading on Friday, with health-care jumping 1.1%, energy rumbling 0.8%, and communications up 0.7%.
The half-dozen laggards were weighed most by consumer discretionary stocks, skidding 0.9%, utilities, off 0.8%, and information technology, fading 0.7%.
ON WALLSTREET
The S&P 500 retreated Friday after the latest inflation report came in hotter than anticipated.
The Dow Jones Industrials gained 63.01 points to kick off the week’s last session at 35,239.16. The Dow is an outlier of the three major averages, on track for a 0.4% gain this week.
The much-broader index docked 0.81 points to 4,468.02.
The NASDAQ Composite fell 39.12 points to 13,698.87, pulled down by a sell-off in semiconductor stocks such as Advanced Micro Devices, Nvidia and Micron.
The S&P 500 is slated to lose 0.5% on the week and the NASDAQ is bound for a decline of 1.9%. Both are on pace for their second straight losing week — a first of that length for the technology-heavy NASDAQ since the conclusion of a four-week losing streak in December 2022.
July’s producer price index rose 0.3% from the previous month. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected the report, which is closely followed by the
Prices for the 10-year Treasury faded slightly, raising yields to 4.12% from Thursday’s 4.11%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices picked up 46 cents to $83.28 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices handed back 10 cents to $1,948.80 U.S. an ounce.
