Canadian stock market gains momentum on financials rally

Canada's main stock market gained momentum Monday with a three-digit rise as financial shares boosted market sentiment ahead of a U.S. central bank's meeting.

The benchmark Toronto Stock Exchange's S&P/TSX composite index rallied 131.26 points, or 0.89 percent, to 14,862.76 points, following a drop of 1.5 percent in the previous week.

The market moved up on investor expectation that the U.S. Federal Reserve might raise the interest rates sooner than expected. Fed officials will gather Tuesday in a monetary policy meeting.

Six of eight major sectors were in the rising streak. Financials, the index's most heavily weighted sector, rose 1.13 percent. Most of the bank shares strengthened when Royal Bank of Canada was up 0.81 percent to 76.3 Canadian dollars (about 59.7 U. S. dollars), and Bank of Montreal advanced 1.11 percent to 76.84 Canadian dollars apiece.

Meanwhile, the data released by Statistics Canada on Monday showed that foreign investors resumed their acquisitions of Canadian securities by adding 5.7 billion Canadian dollars worth to their portfolios.

The biggest gains in TSX Monday were in the health care sector, which hiked 1.65 percent when the drug maker Valeant Pharmaceuticals International jumped 2.43 percent to 258.42 Canadian dollars.

However, the resources group, including the energy sector and the metals and mining sector were in the negative territory, down 0.23 percent and 0.84 percent respectively, when concerns about the oil plunge hammered down the energy sector by nearly 5 percent.

On the currency front, the Canadian dollar moved higher to 0. 7825 U.S. dollars on Monday, compared with 0.7819 U.S. dollars on last Friday. The U.S. dollar declined against most major currencies on Monday ahead of the Federal Reserve policy meeting as investors were worried that the central bank could be cautious in raising interest rates. Endite