Canada’s main stock index fell on Friday to post a slight weekly decline, as a drop in gold prices weighed on metal mining shares.
The Toronto Stock Exchange’s S&P/TSX Composite index ended down 111.92 points, or 0.3 per cent, at 34,857.34, extending its pullback from a record closing high on Tuesday. For the week, the index was down 0.2 per cent.
Global shares also dipped after U.S. and Iranian negotiators called off peace talks. The U.S. stock market was closed for the Juneteenth holiday.
“Financial markets grappled with two nearly equal and offsetting forces this week,” Douglas Porter, chief economist at BMO Capital Markets, said in a note, pointing to the preliminary peace agreement in the Middle East and a more hawkish-than-expected message from the Federal Reserve.
The price of gold fell 1.2 per cent as a hawkish Fed helped underpin the U.S. dollar in recent days.
The materials sector, which includes metal mining shares, fell 2.1 per cent.
Shares of Alamos Gold tumbled 18.4 per cent after the miner cut its production forecast for the second quarter.
Capstone Copper has identified significant groundwater impacts across its Mantos Blancos copper mine in northern Chile that it aims to mitigate as part of a major expansion, according to company materials reviewed by Reuters. The company’s shares ended 4.1 per cent lower.
Canada’s banking regulator, the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, lowered the capital requirement for the country’s biggest banks for the first time in three years, a move that will allow them to lend more.
Still, the heavily weighted financials sector dipped 0.1 per cent.
The price of oil clawed back some recent declines to rise 1.2 per cent. Energy added 0.7 per cent.
MDA Space shares ended 6.3 per cent higher after the space technology firm agreed to buy U.S.-based Blue Canyon Technologies from RTX’s Raytheon business for $620 million in cash.
Reuters