Canadian shares advanced for a third session as energy producers and miners rallied, bucking broader market trends. The Standard & Poor’s/TSX Composite Index (TSE:OSPTX) advanced 0.5 percent to 14,974.66 at 12:44 p.m. in Toronto. Five shares advanced for every three issues that declined as eight out of ten share groups were in the positive territory.
The energy sector, the main index's second most heavily weighted group, rose 0.8 percent even as oil dropped. Suncor Energy (TSE:SU), Canada's largest oil sands producer, gained 2.3 percent to C$35.57. Enbridge (TSE:ENB), Canada's largest pipeline company, advanced 1.4 percent to C$60.33.
Brent crude fell $1.07 to $63.38 a barrel. U.S. crude lost 79 cents to $60.22. Oil eased as a U.S. government report showing crude inventories fell for an eighth week, in a sign a supply glut is easing.
The materials sub-index, which includes mining shares, gained 0.5 percent even as gold edged lower. Goldcorp (TSE:G), Canada’s largest gold miner by market value, added 2.3 percent to C$20.93. Barrick Gold (TSE:ABX), the second-largest, inched up 0.1 percent to C$13.78.
Spot gold was at $1,174.09 an ounce, down 0.3 percent, while U.S. gold futures for August delivery were down $2.80 an ounce at $1,173.80.
Financials, the index's most heavily weighted sector, added 0.6 percent. Royal Bank of Canada (TSE:RY), which has the heaviest weighting in the index, rose 0.7 percent to C$78.48. Toronto-Dominion Bank (TSE:TD), the second-largest bank by market value, gained 0.7 percent to C$54.50.
Rogers Communications (TSE:RCI.B) rose 2.3 percent to C$43.55 after Canada's largest wireless carrier, agreed to buy bankrupt rival Mobilicity for C$440 million to boost service in the west of the country and southern Ontario.
Transition Therapeutics (TSE:TTH) tumbled 73 percent to C$2.98 after the biopharmaceutical development company said it missed its primary endpoint in a phase 2/3 clinical trial of its neuropsychiatric drug candidate ELND005.
Redknee Solutions (TSE:RKN) jumped 3.9 percent to C$4.82 after the software company agreed to buy Orga Systems for EUR38 million, or about $43 million, in cash.
EXFO (TSE:EXF) fell 2.4 percent to C$4.07 after reporting a $600,000 profit in the third fiscal quarter of 2015, down from $1.7 million the same quarter a year earlier. The telecommunications equipment provider said sales rose to $57.8 million from $51 million in the second quarter, but are still not back at its first-quarter level of $63.9 million.
The junior S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index (CVE:OSPVX) inched up 0.2 percent to 684.23 at 12:26 p.m. in Toronto.
In the U.S. market, shares pared earlier losses to trade flat today, though news about a potential bailout deal for Greece continued to weigh in the background. The S&P 500 (INDEXSP:.INX) skidded 0.2 percent to 2,119.12 at 11:50 a.m. in New York. The 30-company Dow Jones Industrial Average (INDEXDJX:.DJI) slipped 0.3 percent to 18,082.91, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (INDEXNASDAQ:.IXIC) fell 0.2 percent to 5,151.96. Most followed shares included Netflix, Lennar, Monsanto, Ford Motor, GM, Catalyst Pharma, DaVita HealthCare, Alcobra, Boeing, and McCormick.