Stock markets closed lower Friday after the July U.S. jobs report sparked concerns that the U.S economic recovery isn’t as strong as previously believed.

The S&P/TSX index fell 39.34 points to 7,218.58. The bench market index lost 0.6% for the week.

Canadian markets will be closed Monday.

The employment report gave investors mixed messages. Although the U.S. unemployment rate declined to 6.2% last month from June’s nine-year high of 6.4%, payrolls were cut by 44,000 and almost half a million disheartened job-seekers gave up looking.

Toronto volume was 146 million shares worth $2 billion. The overall tone was negative as 527 issues declined and 513 rose.

The heavily weighted financial services sector edged down 0.87%, while health care stocks fell 1.13% and telecoms dropped 0.96%.

Gold issues declined 1.07% as the price of bullion
fell sharply.

Fairfax Financial led the net losers, closing down
$13.77 to $228.25.

Research In Motion jumped $4.35, or 12.87%, to $38.14 on rumors that the firm could be the target of a takeover bid by Hewlett-Packard.

The junior TSX Venture Exchange edged 1.32 points lower to 1,213.03.

In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average shed 79.83 points to 9,153.97. The Nasdaq composite index fell 19.43 to 1,715.59. the S&P 500 backed off 10.18 to 980.13.

For the week, the Dow fell 1.4%, the Nasdaq slipped 0.9%, and the S&P 500 fell 1.9%.

Two other major reports that at least met expectations failed to offset the negative jobless report.

The University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey for July rose to 90.9 from 89.7 the month before. And the Institute for Supply Management index of U.S. manufacturing activity was 51.8 in July, up from 49.8 in June.

In the day’s only Canadian economic report, Statistics Canada said most manufacturers surveyed in July did not expect to increase production in the next three months amid lower unfilled orders and higher inventories.