A strong Canadian jobs report and a bump in the price of gas wasn’t enough to fuel Canada’s stock exchange today.
The TSX dropped 141 points below the flatline, with seven of 11 sectors trading lower.
The down day on Bay Street comes despite a Stats Canada report showing that employment rose by 94,000 in November, driven by gains in full-time work.
StatsCan also reported that unemployment dipped to 5.6 percent – the lowest since comparable data became available in 1976.
And over the past year, employment grew by 219,000.
Oil moved 76 cents higher to $52.25 US a barrel after the world’s major exporters reached a deal today to cut output in an effort to stop prices from plummeting.
According to CNBC, OPEC producers agreed to cut output by 800,000 barrels a day starting in January.
With the news, results were mixed among Canadian energy companies. While some slipped into the red, Canadian Natural Resources, Suncor, and Crescent Point moved up between 1.9 and 2.9 percent.
However, the TSX wasn’t able to gain any momentum as ongoing U.S./China trade fears and drops in the financials, tech and industrial sectors dragged the index.
Industrials lost 2.2 percent, led lower by a 3.7 percent drop in Air Canada shares while financials dipped 0.8 percent.
In New York, the Dow fell 558 points, dragged by a weaker-than-expected jobs report combined with mixed messages from Washington about the state of trade tariff negotiations between the U.S. and China.
The tech sector also pulled the exchange down. Apple dropped another 3.5 percent after Morgan Stanley downgraded the company’s stock on declining iPhone sales in China.
It was an all-around red day on Wall Street with drops in Intel, Microsoft, Boeing, Caterpillar, American Express, Goldman Sachs, Home Depot, and Walmart, just to name a few.
It was also a tough day for the tech-dependent Nasdaq which lost 219 points.
The loonie made a big jump, strengthening by 35/100ths of a cent to $0.7508 US while gold was a popular commodity, climbing $10.60 to $1,250 an ounce.
