Trading volume is expected to be light Thursday with U.S. markets closed for the Thanksgiving Day holiday. In Toronto, investors will get a chance to respond to news that Alcan is restructuring its European operations.

Alcan said it. plans to close three European factories, cut 520 jobs and create at least 40 in a restructuring of nine of its sites on the continent.

Oil futures prices rose today in Europe amid concerns about heating oil supplies at the beginning of the Northern Hemisphere winter.

The January contract rose 57¢ to US$45.39 a barrel on the International Petroleum Exchange in London.

European stocks were mostly positive in Thursday trading.. Japan’s Nikkei 225 average closed at 10,900.34, up 28.01 points helped by gains by steel producers.

In Europe, the U.S. dollar continued to stumble, touching a new low against the euro for the third straight day. In early going, the euro had broken though the US$1.32 level and traded as high as US$1.3235 as the session progressed.

In Canada, the loonie was trading at US84.90¢, up from Wednesday’s closing price of US84.72¢.

Yesterday, Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge, speaking in Ottawa, cast doubt on whether the central bank would continue to hike interest rates in next month’s fixed-date policy announcement.

Toronto stocks closed lower Wednesday, dragged down by selling in the heavily weighted financial group. The S&P/TSX composite index fell 19.10 points, or 0.21%, at 8,976.09, on volume of 255 million shares.

Four of the 10 TSX groups were lower, led by a 1.52% drop in financial stocks.

The S&P/TSX Venture composite index closed up 2.34 points, or 0.14%, to 1,702.94, on volume of 107 million shares.

In New York, stocks enjoyed a pre-holiday rally as the Nasdaq found solid support from the tech sector amid bullish broker comments on Google, while blue chips benefited from strength in General Motors and McDonald’s.

U.S. markets will be closed Thursday for the Thanksgiving holiday and open for a shortened trading session Friday.

The Dow Jones industrial average closed up 27.71 points, or 0.3%, at 10,520.31 while the Nasdaq composite index, lifted 18.26 points, or 0.9%, to 2,102.54. The S&P 500 index added 4.82 points, or 0.4% to 1,181.76.