By Stewart Lewis

(March 9 – 17:00 ET) – Stocks finished the week on a down note. Intel’s profit warning sparked a selloff. And good fortune among wage earners meant a dark day for investors, following this morning’s release of better-than-expected American employment data.

The Toronto Stock Exchange 300 composite index fell 92.12 points to 8,135.51. Declining issues outpaced advancing issues 567 to 488. Trading volume was 148.1 million shares, down from yesterday’s total of 191.5 million shares. Trading value fell to $2.63 billion from $3.03 billion.

All but four of the TSE’s 14 sub-indices traded lower. The industrial products group fell 1.99%. Networking giant, Nortel Networks, finished down 41¢ to $27.69. Fibre-optics equipment company, JDS Uniphase, fell $2.70 to $41.30. Wireless Internet device-maker, Research In Motion, dropped $3.90 to $62.40 and electronics manufacturing services company, Celestica, lost $6.45 to $68.05.

The banking group fell 1.03% as investors worried that an expected cut in U.S. interest rates will be less than expected. This worry arose after U.S. employment data showed that the economy hasn’t slowed as much as has been suspected. Royal Bank fell 80¢ to $47.65. CIBC fell 79¢ to $50.45. Bank of Nova Scotia dropped 68¢ to $41.22.

South of the 49th parallel, stocks tumbled on the Intel news. The Nasdaq composite index fell 115.19 points, to 2,053.54, ending the week down about 3%. The Dow Jones industrial average lost 213.63, falling to 10,644.62.

The CDNX, Canada’s venture exchange bucked the day’s trend, adding 14.39 points and climbing to 3,134.50.