Canadian stocks move up after favorable employment data

Canada's main stock market ended the week with a gain, as better-than-expected November labour data and increase in gold contributed.

The Toronto Stock Exchange's benchmark Standard & Poor's/TSX Composite Index moved up 24.99 points, or 0.17 percent, to close the week at 15,052.52 points. Five of the index's 10 sub-sectors finished the session higher.

On Friday, Statistics Canada released the November employment figures that saw 10,700 jobs added to the economy, a 0.1 percent uptick compared with the previous month.

This marked a fourth consecutive month of increases and also saw the unemployment rate fall 0.2 percent to 6.8 percent.

Compared to a year ago, the economy added 183,000 jobs, or 1.0 percent. The data surprised the market, which was expecting a loss of 16,500 jobs.

Despite the figures trending in the right direction, the number of full-time jobs dropped 8,700, while part-time jobs saw a 19,400 increase. The trend towards fewer full-time jobs is evident by a 6.4 percent increase in part time jobs compared to 12 months ago.

Dawn Desjardins, Deputy Chief Economist at Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), believes the increase in part-time jobs is mostly due to voluntary factors.

"While the drop in full-time employment was disappointing, the share of people working part-time who'd prefer to be working full-time was only up marginally from a year ago," said Desjardins.

"Given the volatility in the labour market data, looking at the 12-month trend rate of 15,000 (jobs added) provides a clearer read on the state of the economy."

Ahead of next week's central bank meeting, Desjardins predicted that the benchmark overnight rate will remain unchanged.

"Today's report was the second last piece of data released before the Bank of Canada's meeting on December 7. Evidence that the economy started the fourth quarter on firm footing will likely to be sufficient for the Bank to hold the overnight rate at 0.5 percent."

During the day, the Materials Group was the biggest mover, rising 1.80 percent, as gold prices moved up 0.59 percent to 1,176.30 U.S. dollars an ounce. Gold Miners IAMGOLD Corporation, Barrick Gold, and Kinross Corporation jumped 4.07 percent, 3.95 percent, and 4.54 percent, respectively.

Other groups finishing Friday higher were Health Care (1.30 percent), Consumer Staples (0.88 percent), Telecommunications (0.76 percent), and Financials (0.02 percent).

Financials made news for a third straight day, as National Bank of Canada, Canada's sixth largest bank, released strong fourth quarter results.

After four of the top-five Canadian lenders released favourable fourth quarter results, National Bank of Canada had an 11.03 percent rise in adjusted net income compared with the same quarter last year.

Stock price of the Montreal-based financial institution rose 1.36 percent to 51.52 Canadian dollars (38.77 U.S. dollars).

Groups on the losing side to close the week were Industrials (0.94 percent), Information Technology (0.65 percent), Utilities (0.37 percent), Energy (0.37 percent), and Consumer Discretionary (0.11 percent).

Industrials fell despite Montreal-based Bombardier Inc. shares rising 2.19 percent to 1.87 Canadian dollars after being awarded a contract to lease three aircrafts for Air Tanzania valued at 200-million Canadian dollar.

The Canadian dollar moved up 0.0014 to 0.7526 U.S. dollars. Endit