TSX Settles Moderately Lower As Virus Worries Weigh

(RTTNews) - After a somewhat sluggish start and a subsequent spell in positive territory that lasted till an hour past noon, the Canadian stock market faltered and stayed weak on Wednesday.

Despite rising optimism about potential Covid-19 vaccines, the market turned weak, weighed down by reports showing spikes in coronavirus cases across the world and fresh restrictions in several places.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index, which advanced to 16,990.57 in late morning trades, ended the day with a loss of 58.24 points or 0.34% at 16,889.82.

Financial, energy and information technology stocks found support, while materials, consumer discretionary, real estate and utilities stocks ended weak.

In the financial space, Laurentian Bank (LB.TO) surged up 4.1%, CDN Western Bank (CWB.TO) gained 2%, Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD.TO), National Bank of Canada (NA.TO), Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS.TO) and Onex Corp (ONEX.TO) moved up 1 to 1.7%.

In the energy space, Vermilion Energy (VET.TO) and Whitecap Resources (WCP.TO) gained 3.8% and 3.5%, respectively. Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ.TO) moved up nearly 2% and Tourmaline Oil Corp (TOU.TO) surged up 1.65%.

Technology stocks BlackBerry (BB.TO) and Lightspeed Pos (LSPD.TO) gained about 2.75% each. Shopify Inc. (SHOP.TO) moved up 2.1% and Sierra Wireless (SW.TO) ended 1.6% up.

Weak bullion prices dragged down materials shares. Sivercrest Metals (SIL.TO) tumbled more than 8%. Wheaton Precious Metals (WPM.TO) fell 5.6%, Osisko Mining (OSK.TO), Novagold Resources (NG.TO), Franco-Nevada Corp (FNV.TO), Kirkland Lake Gold (KL.TO), Agnico Eagle Mines (AEM.TO) and MAG Silver (MAG.TO) lost 4 to 5%. Eldorado Gold (ELD.TO), B2Gold Corp (BTO.TO), Barrick Gold Corp (ABX.TO) and Kinross Gold Corp (K.TO) also declined sharply.

On the economic front, data from Statistics Canada showed the annual inflation rate in Canada was up at 0.7% in October, rising from 0.5% a month earlier. The Consumer Price Index increased to 0.4% in October over the previous month.

Core consumer prices in Canada increased 1% in October over the same month in the previous year, the data showed.

On the vaccine front, Pfizer and BioNTech said the final efficacy analysis of an ongoing Phase 3 study of their coronavirus vaccine candidate indicated a vaccine efficacy rate of 95%.

The companies said that efficacy was consistent across age, gender, race and ethnicity demographics and suggested the vaccine candidate also helped to fend off severe disease.

Pfizer and BioNTech said they plan to submit a request to the FDA for an Emergency Use Authorization for the vaccine "within days."