Canadian Market Notably Higher On Fed Rate Cut, Firm Commodity Prices

(RTTNews) - The Canadian market is up firmly in positive territory a little past noon on Thursday with stocks from several sectors moving higher as investors react positively to the Federal Reserve's "big" interest-rate cut, and data showing a drop in U.S. jobless claims last week.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite climbed to a new record high, rising to 23,909.53 this morning. The index is up 241.93 points or 1.03% at 23,834.53 about a quarter past noon.

Technology stocks are rising sharply, lifting the sectoral index up by about 2.7%. Energy and materials stocks are up, riding on firm commodity prices. Industrials, consumer discretionary and financials shares are the other major gainers.

Technology stocks Bitfarms (BITF.TO), Shopify Inc (SHOP.TO) and Dye & Durham (DND.TO) are up 5.6%, 4.3% and 4.2%, respectively. Celestica Inc (CLS.TO), Lightspeed Commerce (LSPD.TO), Converge Technology Solutions (CTS.TO), Kinaxis Inc (KXS.TO), Tecsys Inc (TCS.TO), Docebo Inc (DCBO.TO) and Open Text Corporation (OTEX.TO) are gaining 2.5 to 4%.

Energy stocks Precision Drilling Corp (PD.TO), Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ.TO), Cenovus Energy (CVE.TO), MEG Energy (MEG.TO), Vermilion Energy (VET.TO), Advantage Oil & Gas (AAV.TO) and Imperial Oil (IMO.TO) are up 1.8 to 3%.

In the materials sector, Ivanhoe Mines (IVN.TO), Lundin Mining Corp (LUN.TO), Ero Copper (ERO.TO), Teck Resources (TECK.B.TO), Calibre Mining (CXB.TO), Hudbay Minerals (HBM.TO), Interfor Corp (IFP.TO), Equinox Gold Corp (EQX.TO), New Gold (NDG.TO) and West Fraser Timber (WFG.TO) are gaining 2.5 to 6%.

Among financials shares, Sprott Inc (SII.TO) is up 3.5%. EQB Inc (EQB.TO), goeasy (GSY.TO), Laurentian Bank (LB.TO), Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD.TO), Manulife Financial (MFC.TO), Bank of Montreal (BMO.TO), Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS.TO) and CDN Western Bank (CWB.TO) are gaining 1 to 3%.