S&P 500 hits record; loonie, oil price slide

TORONTO — North American stock markets closed higher heading into the weekend, with one index hitting a new record high, as lower oil prices and strong U.S. earnings results weighed on the Canadian dollar.

“Not much trading volume out there,” said Allan Small, a senior adviser at Holliswealth. “All’s quiet in the markets right now.”

The loonie closed at 76.07 cents US, dropping 0.35 of a cent from Thursday’s close, partly due to a slide in the benchmark oil price. The September crude contract fell 56 cents at $44.19 US per barrel.

“But I think it’s more of a U.S. story of strength versus a Canadian story of weakness,” Small said.

The greenback has benefited from what has so far been a strong earnings season south of the border, he noted.

U.S. banks and tech companies — such as Microsoft, Qualcomm and Intel — have all reported strong results this quarter.

The Toronto Stock Exchange’s S&P/TSX index rose 34.83 points to 14600.66, led by the telecom sector, which was up 1.31 per cent.

Utilities stocks climbed 0.72 per cent, while the health-care sector of the TSX slipped 2.48 per cent.

The financials sector of the TSX was up 0.28 per cent, which Small attributed to a knock-on effect stemming from strong earnings performance by the U.S. banks.

In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average climbed 53.62 points to 18570.85 while the Nasdaq composite added 26.26 points at 5100.16.

The broader S&P 500 composite index gained 9.86 points to hit a new record high of 2175.03.

In commodities, September natural gas was up eight cents at $2.74 US per mmBTU, August gold dropped $7.60 to $1,323.40 US an ounce and September copper contracts fell two cents to $2.24 US a pound.

Traders are looking forward to next week, when both the Bank of Japan and the U.S. Federal Reserve will hold policy meetings.

In Europe, markets were mixed following reports suggesting that countries that use the euro are proving more resilient to the turmoil surrounding Britain’s vote to exit the European Union.

Germany’s DAX index lost 0.1 per cent while France’s CAC 40 index was up 0.1 per cent and Britain’s FTSE 100 climbed 0.5 per cent.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 index gave back 1.1 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index lost 0.2 per cent and South Korea’s Kospi index dipped 0.1 per cent.

Falling oil, potash prices hammer Saskatchewan

REGINA — Low resource prices are being blamed for a big jump in Saskatchewan’s deficit last year.

The final, audited numbers for the fiscal year that ended in March show a deficit of $675 million — a big change from the $107-million surplus the government had predicted.

Finance Minister Kevin Doherty said the deficit is due almost entirely to falling oil and potash prices.

Doherty said the province was counting on receiving federal assistance for wildfire costs before the end of the fiscal year, but that didn’t happen.

When changes in provincial pension obligations are added in, the deficit totals $1.5 billion.

The falling resource prices prompted Standard and Poor’s to downgrade Saskatchewan’s credit rating last month, to double-A plus from triple-A.