North American stocks may open higher Friday despite the release of weaker than expected jobs reports in Canada and the United States.

The slowdown in job creation suggests the U.S. Federal Reserve may not have to raise interest rates much further.

Canada’s unemployment rate crept up by 0.1 percentage points to 6.5% last month as more people entered the job market, Statistics Canada said today.

There was little change in employment in December as an increase of 36,000 full-time jobs was offset by part-time losses of 38,000.

The report was weaker than economists had been expecting.

South of the border, U.S. payrolls expanded by 108,000 jobs during December, well beneath expectations, but hiring in November was revised sharply upward. The December unemployment rate slipped to 4.9%.

European indexes rose in early action.

In Asia, the benchmark Nikkei 225 index rose 2.84 points, or 0.02%, to finish at 16,428.21 points on the Tokyo Stock Exchange – the Nikkei’s highest closing since Sept. 20, 2000.

In Hong Kong, the blue-chip Hang Seng Index rose 73.31 points, or 0.48%, to 15,344.44.

The Canadian dollar opened at US85.73, down 0.22 of a cent, after falling more than 1¢ Thursday on profit taking.

Oil prices rose Friday and natural gas regained ground after a mild start to winter in the United States had pushed prices to a 4 1/2-month low. Light sweet crude for February delivery rose 33¢ to US$63.12 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange

Toronto stocks rose marginally Thursday, taking a break after the strong gains of the two previous sessions, as the energy sector retreated while technology stocks rallied.

The S&P/TSX composite index rose 6.20, or 0.05%, to 11,507.68

The S&P/TSX Venture composite index finished down 9.54 points, or 0.42%, to 2,263.94.

In New York, markets were calm after the big run-ups of earlier this week.

The Dow Jones rose 2 points to 10,882.15, the S&P 500 rose 0.02 of a point, to 1,273.48, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 13.41 points, or 0.59%, to 2,276.87.