Canada’s main stock index ended the week just a touch in negative territory, while strength in tech helped buoy U.S. markets.
The fading name on the building in Toronto that used to house the Toronto Stock Exchange is shown on Thursday, August 18 2011. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Aaron Vincent ElkaimKevin Burkett, portfolio manager at Victoria-based Burkett Asset Management, said headlines around the war in the Middle East, and its impact on global crude oil prices, was likely behind the slight dip on the Canadian market on Friday.
“While the near-term contract has been very, very volatile on oil egress out of Hormuz, the market continues to price in resolution on Iran — and I think fairly quickly,” Burkett said. About 20 per cent of the world’s crude oil supply normally moves from the Persian Gulf and through the strait on its way to destinations around the world.
A ceasefire is tenuously in place between Iran and the U.S. but tensions between the two are still keeping oil tankers from passing through the narrow waterway. The June crude oil contract was down US$1.45 at US$94.40 per barrel, which is still more than 40 per cent higher than it was before the war began in late February.
But contracts for delivery toward the latter part of the year are drifting closer to the US$70 mark, suggesting investors expect the oil supply shock to resolve before too long.
“That explains why producers’ shares haven’t reacted to the degree that I think a lot would have expected if they were just looking at daily headlines on crude oil fluctuations,” Burkett said.was up 56.68 points at 7,165.08, topping its prior all-time high, while the Nasdaq composite rose 398.09 points at 24,836.60. The big Wall Street story on Friday was a blockbuster earnings report and rosy outlook from Intel Corp. Intel shares soared 23.6 per cent for its best day since 1987 after reporting much stronger results for the first three months of the year than analysts expected.
CEO Lip-Bu Tan said the next wave of artificial intelligence technology is increasing the need for Intel’s chips and products, and the company’s forecast for profit in the spring topped analysts’ estimates. While big AI bellwether names like chipmaker Nvidia have been huge drivers on U.S. markets, there’s little on the TSX that offers investors the same kind of leverage to the tech boom, said Burkett.
“So much of the AI optimism has come into components, the physical infrastructure around AI ... Most of the Canadian business is software and oftentimes the wrong type of software,” he said.
“I think Canada’s tech sector on days like today finds itself very out of step with global themes around AI. ”The June gold contract was up US$16.90 at US$4,740.90 an ounce.
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