Rising energy stocks helped the Toronto stock market claw back a chunk of Thursday's slide of almost 3%.
New York indexes were also higher going into the Memorial Day long weekend, as investors set aside some of their worries about the U.S. government's credit rating.
The S&P/TSX composite index was ahead 50.18 points to end the week at 9,999.77.
On the TSX, Magna International slid 73 cents to $36.28 after the governor of the German state where General Motors' Opel unit is based indicated that he favours a bid by the Canadian auto parts maker for the European auto maker. Magna, Italy's Fiat SpA and New York-based buyout firm Ripplewood Holdings LLC submitted plans Wednesday to GM. Details of the bids have not been released.
The TSX energy sector rose, as Petro-Canada gained $1.10 to $44.22 while EnCana Corp. declined 75 cents to $58.01.
The Toronto base metals sector moved up, as Teck Resources rose 73 cents to $15.87.
The gold group was flat as Barrick Gold Corp. gained 68 cents to $42.65
High River Gold Mines Ltd. a troubled Toronto miner with operations in Russia and Africa, tumbled five cents to 18 cents after it said Russia's OAO Severstal plans to offer 18 cents per share to minority shareholders.
The financial sector was up slightly, as investors look ahead to earnings reports coming down from four of the big Canadian banks next week.
CIBC, which reports on Thursday, fell 50 cents $53.70.
The TSX financial sector has surged about 50% since March 9.
Shares in Manulife Financial Corp. firmed up 25 cents to $21.64 as Ottawa announced it is launching a facility that will provide wholesale term borrowing for federally regulated life insurance companies in the event of a financial market freeze-up.
Indigo Books & Music Inc. gained 59 cents to $12.60 as it declared its first dividend. Sales increased four per cent in its latest quarter, but profit weakened.
Sino-Forest Corp., which runs tree plantations in China, toppled $1.51 to $11.30 after announcing an issue of 30 million shares for $330 million.
Economically speaking, Canadian retail sales rose for a third straight month in March, led by new car dealers who offered bigger rebates to lure back customers.
Statistics Canada said overall sales advanced 0.3% to $33.9 billion. Economists expected a 0.5% increase in March, based on the median of 21 estimates.
Sales are rebounding from a trough of $33.1 billion seen in December, in the early months of Canada’s first recession since 1992. The contraction will end in the next few months, according to eight of 11 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News.
New car sales rose 3.6% in March, as dealers offered larger discounts, the report said. Sales were still 16% less than the level of a year earlier.
The Canadian dollar continued its surge, gaining 1.38 cents, to 89.27 cents U.S.
ON BAYSTREET
Of the 13 TSX subgroups, eight ended the day positive. Metals and mining led the charge, up 2.6%, followed by materials, up 1.2%, and energy stocks, ahead 1.1%.
The five losing groups were led by information technology stocks, off 1.3% health-care, subsiding 1.2%, and gold, down 0.4%.
The TSX Venture Exchange gained 6.66 points to 1,096.51 while the Nasdaq Canada Index backslid 4.88 points to 695.93.
ON WALLSTREET
The Dow Jones Industrials average tailed off 14.81 points to 8,277.32.
The S&P 500 index dropped 1.33 points to 887, while the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 3.24 points, to 1,692.01.
U.S. stocks dipped lower Friday, even as investors welcomed signs the U.S. economy is not in imminent danger of a credit downgrade.
Blue-chip stocks had pulled back for four days straight amid concerns about the economy. The Dow tumbled Thursday after Standard & Poor's cut its outlook for the United Kingdom to "negative" from "stable," spurring worries that a similar downgrade could happen to the United States.
But those concerns were tempered by reassuring comments from Moody's, another major ratings agency
Investors found some room for optimism after banks reduced borrowing from the U.S. Federal Reserve's emergency loan program over the past week.
Investment firms didn't borrow at all during the week - the first time that's happened since early September.
Investors took the development as a hopeful sign that some credit stresses are letting up.
The Fed on Thursday said commercial banks averaged $38.2 billion U.S. in daily borrowing over the week that ended Wednesday.
That was down from $39.9 billion U.S. in the previous week.
The U.S. government said Thursday it invested an additional $7.5 billion U.S. in GMAC, the main source of financing for General Motors customers and the main lender for Chrysler.
Sears Holdings Corp., parent company of retailers Sears and K-mart, reported earnings Thursday that beat analysts’ expectations and amended its credit facility to provide additional funding. Shares rose 10.4% Friday.
Gap Inc. said Friday it earned 31 cents U.S. per share in the first quarter, down from 34 cents U.S. a year ago, but slightly better than the 30-cent profit analysts had expected. Shares gained 2.6%.
Another apparel retailer, Aeropostale Inc., reported better-than-expected first-quarter results and issued an upbeat profit forecast. The stock gained 3.6%.
AIG chief Edward Liddy announced late Thursday that he plans to depart the company once the insurer's board of directors finds a replacement.
A consortium of private equity firms acquired BankUnited FSB in Florida after the savings and loan was shut down by federal regulators Thursday. BankUnited was the 34th bank to fail so far this year, and the largest.
Treasury prices fell, raising the yield on the benchmark 10-year note to 3.46% from 3.36% Thursday. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions. The 10-year yield has not been this high since late December.
The bond market closed at 2 p.m. ET Friday.
Oil for July delivery rose 62 cents a barrel to $61.53 U.S.
COMEX gold for June delivery rose eight dollars to $959.00 U.S. an ounce.
