Roundup: Canadian stock market closes higher

Canada's main stock market in Toronto on Monday ended higher slightly when gains driven by consumers commodities stocks overpowered the losses in resources shares.

Toronto Stock Exchange's benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index was up 14.90 points, or 0.1 percent, to 14,756.05 points, after a slump for two consecutive days last week.

Energy and metals and mining, two major resources sectors, led TSX losers by 0.84 percent and 1.22 percent when the volatility in commodities prices including crude oil futures weighed on the trading sentiment.

Shares of oil and gas giants were still in the negative territory when Encana Corp. plunged 1.28 percent to 14.61 Canadian dollars (about 11.86 U.S. dollars) and Suncor Energy Inc. tumbled 1.61 percent to 34.24 Canadian dollars.

And basic metals producers Teck Resources lost 1.72 percent to 13.73 Canadian dollars while First Quantum Minerals went down 1.43 percent to 17.22 Canadian dollars per share.

However, an acquisition deal in the consumer staples sector boosted the TSX index, after the department store retailer Hudson' s Bay Company announced Monday that it has entered into a definitive agreement to buy Kaufhof, Germany's leading department store chain, from Metro in a deal worth 3.3 billion Canadian dollars.

Hudson's Bay was among the best performers in TSX Monday, with its share soaring 7.88 percent to 25.89 Canadian dollars apiece. And Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., the convenience stores operator based in Quebec, rallied 2.77 percent to 53.52 Canadian dollars per share.

Meanwhile, the most weighted sector Financials, which went up 0. 23 percent, helped push up the index when Bank of Montreal rose 0. 98 percent to 74.89 Canadian dollars and Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. jumped 1.82 percent to 636.78 Canadian dollars.

Other sectors little changed with Health Care going down 0.64 percent and Info down 0.6 percent, respectively.

On the economic front, in the latest monthly survey of manufacturing, Statistics Canada reported in Monday morning that manufacturing sales fell 2.1 percent to 49.8 billion Canadian dollars in April, the third decline in four months. And the decline in April reflected lower sales of food, aerospace products and parts, and petroleum and coal products.

On the currency front, the Canadian dollar traded lower at 0. 8119 U.S. dollar Monday, from 0.8123 U.S. dollar last Friday, on the downbeat manufacturing sales data from Statistics Canada. Endite