Equities moved inexorably toward a Canada Day long weekend sharply on the down side, weighed by slips among energy and industrial stocks and a pullback in shares of convenience store operator Alimentation Couche Tard.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index crumbled 167.33 points, or 1.1%, to begin Thursday’s session at 15,188.25
The Canadian dollar hiked 0.83 cents to 76.73 cents U.S.
Couche-Tard shares deducted $2.09, or 3.3%, to $62.25.
Home Capital Group said on Thursday it expects to record a loss in the second quarter due to costs related to its efforts to shore up liquidity.
Home shares gained 21 cents, or 1.2%, to $17.40.
Gabriel Resources will seek $4.4 billion in damages from Romania for losses related to its long-stalled Rosia Montana gold mine project in a claim that the Canadian miner plans to file Friday with a World Bank Tribunal.
Gabriel shares took on two cents, or 7.1%, to 30 cents.
Quebec's largest pension fund has dismissed as "absolute nonsense" claims by Boeing that its $1.5-billion investment in Bombardier's rail business amounted to an unfair subsidy to the Canadian company.
Bombardier shares dipped three cents, or 1.2%, to $2.42.
National Bank of Canada raised the price target on Air Canada to $20.00 from $18.50. The Maple Leaf airline dropped a penny to $17.29.
CIBC assumes coverage on Gluskin Sheff + Associates with an outperform rating. Gluskin shares gained 41 cents, or 2.6%, to $16.47.
Canaccord Genuity started coverage on Spectra7 Microsystems with speculative buy rating. Spectra7 shares were static at 37 cents.
On the economic slate, Statistics Canada told us that average weekly earnings of non-farm payroll employees were $971.00 in April, little changed from March.
Compared with April 2016, earnings were up 2.0%, with most of the increase occurring in the last two months of 2016.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange fell 2.15 points to 769.50
All but one of the 12 TSX subgroups tumbled, with gold down 2.2%, information technology off 2%, and consumer staples sliding 1.8%.
The lone holdout was health-care, up 0.7%.
ON WALLSTREET
Stocks south of the border fell hard in Thursday’s first hour, as descents in tech stocks countered strength in bank issues.
The Dow Jones Industrials eased off 15.73 points to begin Thursday’s trading at 21,438.88, with Apple contributing the most losses.
The S&P 500 surrendered 9.83 points to 2,430.86, with information technology sliding 1.3%.
The NASDAQ slumbered 65.39 points, or 1.1%, to 6,169.02, after yesterday’s sharp gain.
Bank stocks rose sharply on Thursday after the Federal Reserve cleared capital returns programs for the big banks.
The central bank did not object to any of the buybacks or dividend hikes from the 34 banks it reviewed during the second phase of its annual stress test. This is the first time in the seven-year history of the tests implemented in the wake of the financial crisis that all banks have passed.
Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and Bank of America were all at least 1% higher in early trade.
JPMorgan announced a repurchase program of up to $19.4 billion, its biggest since the financial crisis. Citigroup unleashed its largest ever buyback program — worth up to $15.6 billion — and doubled its dividend. Bank of America and Morgan Stanley hiked their quarterly dividends to 12 cents a share and 25 cents a share, respectively.
Tech has been the best-performing sector for most of 2017, rising more than 15% in the period. But over the past month it has dropped nearly 2%.
In economic news, the U.S. Commerce Department reported that economy down south grew at an annualized rate of 1.4% in the first quarter.
Weekly jobless claims, meanwhile, came in at 244,000 for last week, slightly above the expected 240,000.
Prices for the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell, raising yields to 2.23% from Wednesday’s 2.22%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices gained 37 cents to $45.11 U.S. a barrel
Gold prices slumped $5.90 to $1,243.20 U.S. an ounce.
