TORONTO – The Toronto Stock Exchange closed higher on Thursday, supported by rising oil prices and the energy sector, as the price of gold lost some of its luster.
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Toronto’s S & P / TSX Composite Index gained 32.54 points to end the session with 21,072.20 points.
In New York, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 170.64 points to 36,236.47 points. The broader S&P 500 index fell 4.53 points to 4696.05 points, while the Nasdaq composite index fell 19.30 points to 15,080.87 points.
The energy sector was the strongest on the TSX, rising 3.0%. Vermilion Energy shares jumped 9.2% as the price of crude oil briefly exceeded US $ 80 per barrel for the first time in just over seven weeks.
Demand for energy is picking up as the global economy normalizes, despite new lockdowns linked to COVID-19, said Anish Chopra, CEO of Portfolio Management.
“We’re at this inflection point where people are realizing that it’s going to take years to recoup some of that supply of oil, of energy, but the demand is there, so the price of oil is reacting to that. He said in an interview.
On the New York Commodities Exchange, the price of crude oil rose US $ 1.61 to US $ 79.46 per barrel, while that of natural gas fell 7 cents US to $ 3.81 US per million BTUs.
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In the currency market, the Canadian dollar traded at an average rate of 78.49 cents US, down from 78.63 cents US the previous day.
Securities in the financial sector were helped by the minutes of the US Federal Reserve’s December meeting, in which its members supported an early withdrawal of stimulus and a hike in interest rates .
Canadian bank stocks appreciated as 10-year bond yields exceeded 1.7% on both sides of the border. Canadian Western Bank stocks rose 4.6%, Laurentian Bank stocks rose 2.3% and CIBC stocks rose 2.1%.
The tone of the US central bank was not good for the tech and materials sectors, both of which lost ground.
The materials sector fell 2.7%, in part due to the 10.3% drop in Stelco Holdings shares, which came after the Hamilton steelmaker said his deliveries were lower than expected in the fourth. trimester.
Pressure on the sector also came from falling gold prices as central banks prepared to tackle inflation.
The price of gold plunged from US $ 35.90 to US $ 1,789.20 an ounce in New York, and that of copper fell 5.9 cents US to US $ 4.35 per pound.
“Gold tends to be a safe haven against inflation, among other uses, so potential interest rate hikes to fight inflation are not good for gold,” Mr. Chopra.
The information technology sector, for its part, slipped 1.2% on the TSX on Thursday, as Shopify shares recorded a third decline in as many sessions, this time by 1.7%.
The Canadian Press