Canadian Market Moderately Lower In Cautious Trade

(RTTNews) - Despite easing Middle East tensions following Iran and the U.S. halting strikes and agreeing to hold fresh talks to resolve their disputes, the Canadian market is down firmly in negative territory a little past noon on Monday with investors making cautious moves ahead of a review of the trade agreement among U.S., Canada and Mexico.

The focus is also on the developments on the Middle East front.

After renewed hostilities, the United States and Iran have agreed to halt military strikes against each other and meet on Tuesday in Doha, Qatar, to resolve their disputes over shipping routes and transit fees.

Canadian officials are set to meet their Mexican and U.S. counterparts on Wednesday for the first trilateral meeting to review the U.S.-Canada-Mexico trade agreement.

Materials, consumer discretionary and communications sectors are among the major losers. Several stocks from consumer staples and real estate sectors are also notably lower.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index was down 180.21 points or 0.52% at 34,799.79 a little while ago.

B2Gold Corp., Nova Gold Resources, Brookfield Business Partners, Thomson Reuters, Seabridge Gold, Stella-Jones, SSR Mining, Colliers International, Transcontinental, Boyd Resources, Franco-Nevada Corp. and Alamos Gold lost 3%-5.3%.

Rogers Communications, Torex Gold Resources, BCE, Richelieu Hardware, Spin Master, Gildan Activewear, Kinross Gold, Restaurant Brands International, Telus, AtkinsRealis and Wheaton Precious Metals drifted down 2%-3%.

Among the gainers, Interfor climbed more than 8%. BlackBerry surged 7.8%. Canopy Growth, Knight Therapeutics, Real Matters, Altus, Cenovus Energy, Celestica, Chorus Aviation, Bombardier, New Flyer Industries and Aecon gained 1%-4.5%.