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Roundup: Canadian stock market ends lower as resources lose ground

Xinhua, April 17, 2015 Adjust font size:

Canada's main stock market in Toronto on Thursday declined as a slump in resources shares weighed on the trading sentiment, due to investors' concern about the falling commodities.

Toronto Stock Exchange's benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index dropped 64.10 points, or 0.41 percent, to 15,386.77 points.

Metals and Mining sector led the decline by 1.42 percent as gold prices plunged after U.S. Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer repeated his view to the media that the central bank is likely to raise rates this year.

Gold futures on the COMEX division of the New York Mercantile Exchange fell with the most active gold contract for June delivery shedding 3.3 U.S. dollars to settle at 1,198 U.S. dollars per ounce.

S&P/TSX Global Gold Index lost 1.88 percent to 164.24 points when most of the heavyweights were in the red. The world's biggest gold producer Barrick lost 2.47 percent to 15.4 Canadian dollars (about 12.62 U.S. dollars) while the Goldcorp Inc. also fell 1.55 percent to 24.16 Canadian dollars.

The energy sector lost ground by 1.01 percent, after a five-day rally in a row.

Although the oil prices extended gains Thursday over the U.S. crude production decrease, investors were still concerned about the falling demand from China, one of the world's biggest energy consumers, after Chinese official data showed Wednesday that China 's GDP growth slowed to 7 percent in the first quarter of this year, the slowest growth since 2009, indicating mounting downward pressure.

Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. dropped 2.76 percent to 40.84 Canadian dollars a share, and Suncor Energy Inc. declined 1.48 percent to 40.07 Canadian dollars a share.

However, the most weighed sector Financials added 0.07 percent, when Toronto-Dominion Bank ticked up 0.23 percent to 56.03 Canadian dollars, and Bank of Nova Scotia increased 0.46 percent to 65.73 Canadian dollars.

In other gainers, Healthcare and Telecom advanced 0.37 percent and 0.33 percent, respectively.

In companies' news, Canadian auto-parts maker Magna International Inc. on Thursday announced that it has signed an agreement to sell substantially all of its interiors operations to the Spanish company Grupo Antolin, a leading global supplier of automotive interior systems. The purchase price for the operations is estimated at 525 million U.S. dollars. Its stock inched lower 0. 2 percent to 66.52 Canadian dollars.

Canadian National Railway Company, the largest rail network operator in Canada announced Thursday an investment of about 500 million Canadian dollars in infrastructure improvements to its Western Canada feeder rail lines. Its share was down 0.47 percent to 80.99 Canadian dollars.

On the currency front, the Canadian dollar on Thursday traded higher at 0.8210 U.S. dollar, compared with 0.8130 U.S. dollar Wednesday. Endite