Stocks in Canada’s largest market looked set to follow global markets higher after the Bank of Japan sprang a surprise by taking one of its main interest rates into negative territory.
The S&P/TSX composite index climbed 214.16 points, or 1.7%, to close Thursday at 12,591.93. March futures were up 1% Friday.
The Canadian dollar shed 0.19 cents to 71.1 cents U.S. early Friday.
Brookfield Asset Management Inc has been exploring an acquisition in recent months of General Growth Properties Inc, the U.S. mall operator with a market value of $24 billion, according to people familiar with the matter.
Endeavour Silver Corp said Thursday it will will reduce production of the precious metal this year by more than a quarter because of low prices. Meanwhile, BMO cut the rating on Endeavour Silver to underperform
Raymond James raised the rating on Athabasca Oil to outperform from market perform.
BofA Merrill cut the rating on WestJet Airlines to underperform from neutral
With consumer inflation just 0.1% in the year to December despite three years of aggressive money-printing, the BOJ's policy board decided in a narrow 5-4 vote to charge a 0.1%interest on a portion of current account deposits that financial institutions hold with the central bank.
On the economic beat, Canada’s Gross Domestic Product rose 0.3% in November, mostly as a result of increases in wholesale and retail trade, oil and gas extraction as well as manufacturing. GDP’s November gain follows a 0.5% decline in September and no growth in October.
Statistics Canada also said that its Industrial Product Price Index declined 0.2% in December, mainly as a result of lower prices for energy and petroleum products. The Raw Materials Price Index fell 5.0% in the same month, led by lower prices for crude energy products.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange moved up 2.58 points Thursday to 492.45
ON WALLSTREET
U.S. stock futures are rising by about 1% as investors cheer the latest official effort by Japan to pump free money into the financial system.
Ahead of the opening bell, futures for the Dow Jones Industrials jumped 99 points, or 0.6%, to 16,071, futures for the S&P 500 added 10.25 points, or 0.5%, to 1,891. NASDAQ futures grew 14.5 points, or 0.4%, to 4,168.25.
Shares in Amazon are falling by 12% pre-market after the company's earnings badly missed Wall Street forecasts.
Shares in Microsoft are rising by about 4% pre-market after the tech giant reported better-than-expected quarterly results.
Investors are watching Xerox as the company is expected to announce it will split itself into two companies. The firm is also reporting earnings Friday morning.
Shares in Sony surged by 6% in Japan after the company reported quarterly results that beat market expectations. The company said strong revenue from its movies and PlayStation 4 helped offset declines in other business units.
Xerox, along with MasterCard, Chevron, Whirlpool and Colgate-Palmolive are among the long list of companies reporting ahead of the open.
On the economic front, the U.S. government is releasing its latest GDP data for the fourth quarter this morning.
The Bank of Japan is stepping up its efforts to push the country's struggling economy forward by taking interest rates into negative territory.
The central bank announced Friday that it will introduce an interest rate of minus 0.1%, and will go even lower if needed.
European markets are also rising by about 1% to 2%. And all Asian stock markets closed the week with gains.
Oil prices gained 22 cents to $33.44 U.S. a barrel
Gold prices hiked 93 cents to $1,116.26 U.S. an ounce.
