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Roundup: Canadian stock market makes upwards correction as energy, medical shares rally

Xinhua, December 16, 2015 Adjust font size:

Canada's main stock market in Toronto Tuesday rebounded with a solid rally as energy and medical care stocks rose sharply.

The Toronto Stock Exchange's benchmark Standard & Poor's/ TSX Composite Index soared 224.08 points, or 1.77 percent, to settle at 12,919.57 points, with all the major sectors in the winning territory except the mining sector, which is down 1.6 percent.

The index gained momentum when the oil prices bounced up after a slump in the previous trading days, with the light, sweet crude for January delivery up 1.04 U.S. dollars to settle at 37.35 dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Monday.

Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. rallied 2.95 percent to 29.67 Canadian dollars (about 21.61 U.S. dollars) while Canada's biggest energy company Suncor Energy Inc. also added 1.68 percent to 35.13 Canadian dollars.

However, "Overall, prices are expected to remain quite low through the first half of 2016", according to a report issued by TD Bank on Tuesday, and the price may stand at 55 U.S. dollars per barrel by the end of the year (2016).

And medical group soared 3.8 percent when Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. jumped 15.87 percent to 149.75 Canadian dollars after the Canadian drug maker reportedly got credibility boost after the company decided on Tuesday to sell its products at a discount to the largest drug retail chain in the U.S.

On economic beat, Bank of Canada, the central bank in this country, released its financial system review on Tuesday, listed four key risks to the Canadian outlook, warning that the household indebtedness and imbalance in the housing sector are the threats to Canada's financial sector.

"In terms of household debt, income growth hasn't kept pace with increases in borrowing, since mortgage growth continues to rise", according to the governor Stephen S. Poloz, the number of highly indebted households in Canada has increased, "by which I mean those whose debts are more than 350 percent of their annual gross income."

On the currency front, the Canadian dollar Tuesday was slightly higher to 0.7282 U.S. dollar at 4 O'clock (the Canadian Eastern Daylight Time), when compared with 0.7279 U.S. dollar on Monday. Enditem