By James Langton
(October 4 – 14:30 ET) – With most traders expecting U.S. interest rates to remain unchanged tomorrow, continued improvements in the gold price are driving up the market. The TSE 300 index was up about 72 points at midday.
Volume has been rather light at 53 million shares, yet decidedly positive at about 7:2 in favour of buyers. Advancers are just edging decliners 9:8.
Gold stocks are driving the buying again today, up more than 3%. Barrick, Placer and Vengold are among the top 10 traders by volume this morning.
The new S&P/TSE 60 participation units debuted today. They are trading heavily too. More than 2.1 million units of the 10.2 million unit issue have changed hands. They’ve climbed 50¢.
Apart from the golds most of the rest of the market is lightly to the upside. The utilities are also notably strong, thanks to news of Bell Canada’s bid for a bigger stake in Aliant. BCE, B Split, Teleglobe and Nortel are all up strongly. Other assorted techs – Biovail, Delrina and Open Text – are having a good day too. JDS Uniphase is up on news of its minor merger announcement this morning.
Air Canada was halted this morning, only to come out and admit that it is in talks with other possible bidders, but refusing to provide any further details.
On the downside, financial management firms are leading the way. Crown Life, E-L Financial and Power Corp. have all dropped.
Montreal followed the TSE up. It was up about 24 points at midday. A 20-point rise in Alberta and three points up in Vancouver completes the unanimous bullish story today.
In New York markets are up and gathering a little midday momentum, as interest rate fear gives way to some merger-made optimism. The Dow is up more than 130 points. Nasdaq has added 30 pointsand the S&P is up by almost 15 points.