The Toronto stock market tripped over its feet to start Friday’s session as commodity prices advanced at the end of a volatile week.
The S&P/TSX composite index dipped 12.68 points, to 11,902.75, after yesterday’s 250-point-plus tumble.
The Canadian dollar inched up 0.19 cents to 97.20 cents U.S.
Canadian stocks to watch include Yamana Gold Inc., which has started operations at its Mercedes mine in Sonora, Mexico. Yamana anticipates production to be 120,000 gold equivalent ounces each year, though the company looks to boost that number to 130,000 ounces per year by 2013. Yamana has projects throughout South America as well as Mexico.
Oil sands operator Opti Canada Inc. said it received all regulatory approvals to be acquired by China's top offshore oil producer CNOOC Ltd.
Economically speaking, traders also took in data showing that Canada’s annual inflation rate fell three-10ths of a point to 2.9% last month as the rate of price increases of most consumer goods measured by Statistics Canada moderated.
That’s the first time the annual inflation rate has been within the Bank of Canada’s 1-3% comfort zone since July. As well, the bank’s core inflation rate, which excludes volatile items such as energy and some foods, edged down one notch to 2.1%
Elsewhere, StatsCan reported that the composite leading indicators rose 0.2% in October, after a gain of 0.1% in September. The basket of 10 components showed five moving upwards -- most notably household spending -- four subsiding (manufacturing the worst off) and one flat.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange added 7.31 points to 1,606.52, while the Nasdaq Canada index shed 0.31 points to 402.20.
The 14 Toronto subgroups were evenly split between gainers and losers. Energy and material stocks edged ahead 0.3% each, while information technology issues gained 0.2%.
The seven laggards were weighed by health-care, fading 0.7%, while consumer discretionaries and telecoms dumped 0.5% each.
ON WALLSTREET
In New York, stocks opened slightly higher Friday, as investors keep a close watch on political developments in the euro-zone
The Dow Jones Industrials began Friday up 48.36 points, to 11,819.10
The S&P 500 nipped up 2.36 points, to 1,218.49, while the Nasdaq Composite Index moved down 4.51 points to 2,583.48.
Shares of Salesforce.com dropped Friday, after the cloud-based software maker reported a $3.8-million U.S. third-quarter loss late Thursday.
HJ Heinz posted quarterly earnings early Friday that just beat analyst expectations, but its revenue of $2.8 billion U.S. missed estimates, sending shares slightly lower.
Shares of Ann Taylor jumped after the retailer posted earnings that beat expectations and said same-store sales rose 7.9%.
Hewlett-Packard's stock rose after the PC-maker added activist shareholder Ralph Whitworth to its board late Thursday. HP is on deck to report quarterly earnings early next week.
On Thursday, Angie's List, an online provider of consumer reviews, gained 25% in its public debut Thursday. Shares slipped early Friday.
While U.S. markets may get a temporarily breather Friday barring any major news out of the euro-zone, investors are being yanked along day to day by European headlines, whether they like it or not, so experts say.
The euro-zone debt crisis appears to be spreading to larger economies in Europe. Yields on Italian, Spanish and French government bonds are rising amid doubts that European policymakers will be able to resolve the continent's problems.
While efforts in Greece and Italy to tame the debt crisis have taken center stage in recent weeks, investors are beginning to turn their attention to other euro-zone countries like Spain.
Economically speaking, the U.S. Conference Board's Leading Economic Indicators Index will be released today, combining data on stock prices, manufacturing, consumer expectations and other issues.
Analysts surveyed by Briefing.com expect the index to have increased by 0.6% for the month of October after increasing 0.2% in the month prior.
The price on the 10-year Treasury faded, boosting the yield to 1.99% from Thursday’s 1.96%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil for October delivery regained 64 cents to $99.46 U.S. a barrel
Gold futures for December delivery added $2.20 to $1,722.40 U.S. an ounce.
