TSX Recovers From Early Losses, Ends Session Marginally Up

(RTTNews) - After opening negative gap and plunging deeper into the red Thursday morning, the Canadian market recovered gradually and moved into positive territory around mid afternoon to eventually end the day's session marginally up, thanks to strong buying in materials stocks.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index, which dropped about 235 points to 21,638.37 in early trades, rallied to 21,920.15 before settling at 21,885.38, gaining 11.66 points or 0.05%.

Worries about the outlook for interest rates rendered the mood bearish at the start.

The Materials Capped Index climbed about 2.25%. Teck Resources (TECK.B.TO) surged 8.7%. MAG Silver Corp (MAG.TO) and Capstone Mining Corp (CS.TO) gained about 7% and 6.4%, respectively.

New Gold Inc (NGD.TO), Ivanhoe Mines (IVN.TO), Hudbay Minerals (HBM.TO), K92 Mining Inc (KNT.TO), Oceanagold Corp (OGC.TO), Silvercrest Metals (SIL.TO) and Barrick Gold Corp (ABX.TO) gained 3 to 5.1%.

Precision Drilling Corporation (PD.TO) gained about 1.2% after the company reported first-quarter net earnings of $37 million or $2.53 per share, compared to $96 million or $7.02/share in the first quarter of 2023.

Energy stock Advantage Oil & Gas (AAV.TO) gained nearly 3.5%. The company reported first-quarter net income of $23.2 million or $0.14 per share, compared to $29.7 million or $0.18 per share in the year-ago quarter.

Africa Oil Corp (AOI.TO) and Arc Resources (ARX.TO) gained 3.4% and 2.3%, respectively. Athabasca Oil Corp (ATH.TO), Tourmaline Oil Corp (TOU.TO), Baytex Energy (BTE.TO) and Crescent Point Energy (CPG.TO) also ended notably higher.

Bombardier Inc (BBD.A.TO) rallied 9%. Cargojet (CJT.TO), Sprott Inc (SII.TO), Wheaton Precious Metals (WPM.TO), Franco-Nevada Corporation (FNV.TO) and Agnico Eagle Mines (AEM.TO) were among the other major gainers in the session.

Mullen Group (MTL.TO) tanked 9%. The company reported first-quarter net income of $22.2 million, compared to $31.7 million in the year-ago quarter.

Shopify Inc (SHOP.TO) ended down 2.7%. FirstService Corp (FSV.TO), Celestica Inc (CLS.TO), CGI Inc (GIB.A.TO), Colliers International (CIGI.TO), Kinaxis Inc (KXS.TO), Molson Coors Canada Inc (TPX.B.TO) and Constellation Software (CSU.TO) also ended notably lower.

On the economic front, data from Statistics Canada showed average weekly earnings of non-farm payroll employees in Canada increased by 4.5% (Y0Y) to $1,232 in February.