Canadian dollar and business outlook

By Commodity News Service Canada

WINNIPEG, May 16 – The Canadian dollar gained ground against its US counterpart on Monday, as a bullish estimate from Goldman Sachs helped crude oil prices gain.

Goldman Sachs said recent outages from producers like Canada and Nigeria have moved the market near deficit levels, which supported crude prices and the commodity-linked loonie.

At 8:42 a.m. CDT, the Canadian dollar was at US$0.7759 or C$1.2888 which compares with Friday’s North American close of US$0.7731, or C$1.2935.

New York Mercantile crude oil futures had gained US$1.08 to sit at US$47.29 a barrel, as of 8:42 CDT.

In Canadian domestic data, refineries received 7.6 million cubic metres of crude oil in February, down 5.7 per cent from February 2015, Statistics Canada said in a report on Monday.

The TSX was stronger in early activity, up 132.1 points at 8:42 a.m. CDT to sit at 13,880.70.