An already-stellar week for U.S. markets was capped Friday by another solid gain, while Canadian markets had to settle for a session that started well but ended mostly flat.

At close on Friday, the S&P/TSX composite began the day in mostly positive fashion, but finished only 2.13 points or 0.02% ahead to 1636.67. For the week, the TSX lost 0.06%. The TSX venture exchange gained 15.34 points or 0.95% to close at 1636.67.

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 72.78 points, or 0.71%, to close at 10387.54. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index was up 4.50 points, or 0.39%, to end at 1,166.17. The technology-laced Nasdaq Composite Index was up 15.31 points, or 0.76%, to finish at 2,038.94. For the week, the Dow gained 3.6%, while the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 each gained about 3.2%.

The Canadian dollar shot past the US83¢ level, trading up 0.65 of a cent at US83.47 cents late in the day as the U.S. dollar continued to weaken despite good economic data. The C$ was helped by a strong Canadian jobs report for October showing the creation of 34,000 jobs – about 5,000 more than expected.

The TSX was saved, as it has been much of the week, by rising bullion prices. Gold futures increased Friday to climb above US$434 an ounce to mark the metal’s highest closing price in almost 16 years. Gold for December delivery climbed $3.50 to close at US$434.30 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The TSX gold sub-index jumped 2.54% with the mining and materials sub-indices also ahead, 1.18% and 1.56% respectively.

Holding Bay Street back were financial stocks, down 0.54%, and technology issues, off 3.04%. The big loser among financials was Manulife Financial, which declined 4.54% despite posting strong earnings growth in the third quarter.

Tech stocks were dragged down largely by Research In Motion, which lost 12.94% after the heavily weighted stock was downgraded by UBS earlier this week.

In New York, investors, who celebrated a decisive presidential election win on Tuesday, got more good news that the U.S. economy is finally showing strong job creation. The U.S. Labour Department said 337,000 jobs were created in October — almost twice the consensus level that economists had expected.

Investors were also happy to see oil prices stable as light, sweet crude for December delivery in New York rising just 18¢ to US$49 after dropping more than $2 on Thursday.

However, some investors feared that the increase in wages flowing into the economy could trigger inflation. That prompted a selloff on the bond market, with the yield on 10-year notes reaching 4.18%. Investors grew increasingly certain that the Federal Reserve would raise interest rates in both its November and December meetings to combat the inflationary pressure.

Since Oct. 25, the Dow has been up in eight of the last nine sessions, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq enjoyed nine straight gains, buoyed by lower oil prices, President Bush’s election victory and the jobs report.