Canadian dollar and business outlook

Glacier FarmMedia | MarketsFarm — The Canadian dollar was slightly firmer relative to its United States counterpart Friday morning.

At 9:17 a.m. CDT the Canadian dollar was trading at US$0.7215 or US$1=C$1.3860 which compares with Thursday’s close of US$0.7209 or US$1=C$1.3872.

Canadian retail sales decreased by 0.4 per cent in February to C$69.3 billion, reported Statistics Canada. However, core retail sales were up 0.5 per cent on the month. Advanced data for March suggests a 0.7 per cent increase in overall retail sales.

Canada’s residential building and non-residential building construction price indexes were both up by 0.8 per cent in the first quarter, reported StatCan.

The TSX was down by 40.71 points at 8:37 CDT to trade at 24,686.82.

Crude oil was weaker in early trade, with West Texas Intermediate crude oil down by 0.75 per cent at US$62.32 per barrel.