Canada's jobless rate up to 6.9 pct in July

Canada's unemployment rate rose to 6.9 percent in July from 6.8 percent the previous month, an increase in line with economists' forecasts, Statistics Canada said on Friday.

It said the Canadian market lost 31,200 net jobs in July, an unexpectedly steep decline that included the biggest one-month drop in full-time work in nearly five years.

Meanwhile, the country's exports fell 4.7 percent in the second quarter to 124 billion Canadian dollars (one Canadian dollars equals 0.71 U.S. dollar), the steepest slide since the second quarter of 2009.

Therefore, Canada's quarterly trade deficit rose to a record 10.7 billion Canadian dollars in the second quarter, up from 6.4 billion Canadian dollars in the first quarter.

It means the trade is going to subtract from growth in the second quarter and is basically reinforcing a view point that Canadian GDP actually contracted about 1.5 percent annualized in the second quarte.

However, some analyst said that a strong rebound is expected in exports in the second half of 2016 due to the strengthening United States economy and the still-weak Canadian dollar. Endit