The Toronto stock market was slightly lower Thursday amid well-received earnings reports from the resource sector, and from mainly lower commodity prices.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index dipped 3.16 points to end Thursday at 12,659.17, after earnings released from Teck Resources and Husky Energy beat expectations. But global fertilizer producer PotashCorp weighed on the TSX as it missed expectations and lowered its 2013 profit forecast.
The Canadian dollar strengthened 0.48 cents to 97.44 cents U.S.
Teck reported a second-quarter adjusted profit of $197 million or 34 cents a share, down sharply from $398 million of profit a year ago but three cents above estimates.
One of Canada's largest coal producers and a major miner of copper, zinc and other commodities, Teck said it's increasing cost-reduction efforts to deal with lower prices for its products. Its shares advanced 72 cents to $24.41.
Husky Energy gained 57 cents to $30.15 as it said quarterly profit rose 40% from a year ago to $605 million or 59 cents a share. Earnings ex-items were 62 cents, five cents better than estimates.
Meanwhile, Goldcorp Inc. reported a $1.93-billion U.S. net loss in the second quarter, as it was hit by a massive writedown of its Penasquito mine in Mexico due to the falling price of gold and its impact on the project's exploration potential.
The Vancouver-based mining company says it would have been profitable in the second quarter without the writedown, but its adjusted earnings were still down from last year and missed analyst estimates. Its shares lost 39 cents to $28.85.
Shares in PotashCorp fell 82 cents to $38.35 after it cut its profit estimate for the current year and reported a quarterly profit of $643 million, or 73 cents per diluted share, up from $522 million, or 60 cents per share, a year ago. The results missed estimates for a profit of 79 cents per share.
The energy sector was up, as Precision Drilling ran up 47 cents to $10.39 as the company posted a quarterly profit of only $473,000, worth less than a penny per share.
That was down from a profit of $18 million, or six cents per share, a year earlier as the company felt the impact of softer conditions in the oil and gas industry.
However, analysts had expected a one-cent-a-share loss and revenue also came in better than expected.
The Teck results helped push the base metals sector up while September copper was unchanged at $3.18 U.S. a pound. Elsewhere in the sector, Turquoise Hill Resources rose a penny to $5.33.
The gold sector was ahead with Iamgold gained 13 cents to $5.45.
In other corporate news, BlackBerry is laying off 250 workers in its new product testing facility in Waterloo, Ont. Its shares slipped four cents to $9.26.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange slid 2.59 points to 923.81
In all, nine of the 14 Toronto subgroups were higher on the day, led by gold, up 0.5%, while metals and mining stocks and industrials were each better by 0.3%.
The five laggards were weighed mostly by utilities, down 0.8%, consumer staples, down 0.4%, and telecoms, off 0.3%.
ON WALLSTREET
U.S. stocks inched into positive territory Thursday afternoon as investors digested mixed earnings results and a pair of tepid economic reports.
The Dow Jones Industrials gained 13.37 points to close at 15,555.60
The S&P 500 index edged up 4.31 points to 1,690.25. The NASDAQ improved 25.59 points to 3,605.19
But investors largely lacked conviction to push stocks decidedly in any one direction. In summer, volumes tend to be light and all three indexes have gained more than 18% so far this year.
More than a third of the companies in the S&P 500 have reported second-quarter results so far, according to S&P Capital IQ. As of Thursday morning, 66% had topped analysts' lowered expectations.
Shares of Facebook surged more than 25% Thursday, a day after the social networking site posted strong quarterly results, led by a marked improvement in its mobile business.
The momentum propelled Zynga's stock, as well. The app developer, which has games on Facebook, will report its own quarterly earnings after the bell.
Dow Chemical and Tripadvisor reported quarterly profit gains.
General Motors reported an improvement in second-quarter earnings but a slowdown in China pressured overall profits.
Homebuilders were the biggest drags on the S&P 500.
PulteGroup reported earnings and revenue that fell way short of forecasts. D.R. Horton also reported earnings that came in shy of expectations.
Baidu shares surged after the Chinese Internet company reported a second quarter profit that topped analyst expectations.
Amazon and Starbucks are due to report after the close.
In economic news, the government released jobless claims data Thursday morning in line with expectations. Initial claims rose to 343,000 for the week ended July 20, an increase of 7,000 from the previous week.
New orders of durable goods, also reported by the Census Bureau, surged past expectations. The number jumped by 4.2% in June to $244.5 billion U.S. and has risen for four of the past five months. The increase is largely due to a $5.4-billion U.S. increase in non-defense spending for capital goods.
Prices for the 10-year U.S. Treasury fell slightly, raising yields to 2.60% from Wednesday’s 2.59%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices inched up 15 cents to $105.54 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices were $9.90 stronger to $1,329.60 U.S. an ounce.
