Canadian stock market plunges as resources extend losses

Canada's main stock market in Toronto Friday lost ground after five straight days of gains, due to the extended losses from resources shares.

Toronto Stock Exchange's benchmark Standard & Poor's / TSX Composite Index was lower 88.24 points or 0.6 percent to 14,642.84 points.

Resources extended losses to lead the fall when the prices of commodities including gold and oil were in the losing streak.

Metals and mining dived 2.27 percent when most of the gold shares dropped sharply when the most active gold contract for August delivery fell 12 dollars, or 1.05 percent, to settle at 1, 131.90 U.S. dollars per ounce on the COMEX division of the New York Mercantile Exchange on Friday.

S&P/TSX Global Gold Index, a leading benchmark of global gold portfolios, plunged 4.75 percent when Goldcorp Inc. lost 6.1 percent to 19.10 Canadian dollars (about 14.71 U.S. dollars) and the world's biggest gold producer Barrick dropped 4.84 percent to 11.4 Canadian dollars per share.

Another resources group Energy fell 1.97 percent when Canadian Oil Sands Ltd. shrank 5.37 percent to 8.1 Canadian dollars and Suncor Energy Inc. lowered to 34.58 Canadian dollars by 1.87 percent.

Besides, the most influential sector Financials gave back 0.45 percent when investors took profits from a big rally in banks shares on Thursday,

Canada's biggest bank Royal Bank of Canada was down 0.78 percent to 77.30 Canadian dollars while Toronto-Dominion Bank, the second largest lender in Canada, retreated 0.51 percent to 53.03 Canadian dollars.

Health Care traded lower by 0.16 percent when its heavyweight Valeant Pharmaceuticals International declined 1.14 percent to 306. 51 Canadian dollars after it announced on Friday that the drug- maker has entered into a definitive agreement under which Valeant will acquire Mercury (Cayman) Holdings, the holding company of Amoun Pharmaceutical, for consideration of approximately 800 million U.S. dollars, plus contingent payments.

On the economic front, Statistics Canada reported on Friday that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 1.0 percent in the 12 months to June, after increasing 0.9 percent in May.

The federal agency said that lower energy prices continued to moderate the year-over-year rise in the CPI, however, the effect was less pronounced than in April and May.

The Canadian central bank downgraded its growth outlook significantly in its Monetary Policy Report on Wednesday, with real GDP expected to advance only 1.1 percent in 2015. A report issued by TD Bank on Friday said that the significant degree of economic slack that opened up in Canada's economy over the first half of the year warranted additional monetary stimulus to keep underlying inflation from falling further below the central bank' s two percent target.

On the currency front, the Canadian dollar was still in the negative territory on Friday to trade at 0.7700 U.S. dollar, when compared with 0.7710 U.S. dollar on Thursday, after the greenback was stronger against major currencies.