TSX Ends Modestly Higher

(RTTNews) - The Canadian stock market ended the shortened trading session on Thursday with modest gains, thanks to some strong buying in a few technology, utilities and consumer staples shares.

Healthcare, energy and consumer discretionary stocks were mostly subdued in the cautious and somewhat lackluster session.

While positive news on the Brexit front and optimism abvout economic recovery thanks to the rollout of coronavirus vaccine supported the market, the rapid surge in new cases due to Covid-19 infections rendered the mood cautious.

Also, with a long weekend ahead, investors were extremely reluctant to build up positions.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index ended with a gain of 30.31 points or 0.17% at 17,623.88 after scaling a low of 17,568.49 and a high of 17,641.69 intraday, The index gained about 0.5% in the holiday shortened week.

Bombardier Inc. (BBD.B.TO) and Village Farms International (VFF.TO) both ended stronger by over 5% on impressive volumes.

Shopify Inc (SHOP.TO), Docebo Inc. (DCBO.TO), Boralex Inc. (BLX.TO), Kinaxis Inc. (KXS.TO) and Lightspeed Pos (LSPD.TO) also closed notably higher.

TransAlta Renewables Inc. (RNW.TO) and TransAlta Corporation (TA.TO) gained 6.5% and 4.9%, respectively, after TransAlta Corp. announced that it is selling power transmission assets in Canada and the United States to its majority owned subsidiary TransAlta Renewables Inc. for $439 million.

On the economic front, data from Statistics Canada showed the total value of building permits in Canada rose 12.9% to C$ 9.4 billion in November, the third highest on record. Building permits had plunged by a revised 12.6% a month earlier.