Toronto's main stock index closed flat on Friday as Toronto Dominion Bank and other banks fell after Bank of America Corp reported a quarterly loss, but gold-mining shares provided some lift. With the price of gold firming, four gold-mining shares claimed spots in the top 10 most notable advancers, with Goldcorp gaining 1.4 percent to C$44.03.
Yamana Gold rose 3.5 percent to C$12.90, while Kinross added 1.5 percent to C$24.01. Agnico-Eagle was up 1.6 percent at C$73.83. The weakness in some of the banks stemmed from market disappointment over a bigger than expected loss at Bank of America, which was a setback for investors who had been wowed by some strong US corporate earnings earlier in the week.
Toronto-Dominion Bank was one of the top decliners, falling 1 percent to C$65.24, while Bank of Nova Scotia lost 0.7 percent to C$46.64. Shares of Royal Bank of Canada clawed back from early weakness to close up 0.16 percent at C$56.05. The S&P/TSX composite index finished at 11,504.76, up 0.25 of a point, after dropping nearly 100 points early in the session.
"I think one conclusion you can draw from the action today and the past few days is that dips continue to be bought," said Elvis Picardo, analyst and strategist at Global Securities in Vancouver. "We were down quite substantially but we've recovered to close flat." Adding to investor caution was an unexpected drop in US consumer sentiment for October.
The economic outlook continues to be a key concern, and the Bank of Canada will give its views next week. Data on Friday showed Canadian consumer prices fell in September from a year earlier and while some of the details were mixed, the lack of inflation is likely to permit the central bank to hold the line on interest rates when it announces policy next Tuesday, and to repeat its conditional pledge that rates will stay unchanged at 0.25 percent through mid-2010.
Among most active issues on Friday was Timminco Ltd, which rose as much as 38 percent after it said it will increase silicon metal production at its Becancour, Quebec, plant, the final stage of its return to full capacity after production was curtailed in April on waning demand. Shares in Timminco closed up 36.2 percent at C$1.73. The main index finished the week up 0.6 percent, its second weekly rise in a row.
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