Bay Street Likely To Open On Cautious Note; Fed Policy In Focus

(RTTNews) - It's likely to be a cautious start for the Canadian market Wednesday morning, with investors digesting the nation's GDP reading, and awaiting the Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement, due later in the day.

The Fed is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged, but the accompanying policy statement and Fed Chair Jerome Powell's post-meeting press conference may offer clues on how soon the Fed could begin easing rates.

Preliminary readings on Canadian GDP growth for the month of November, and final figures for the month of November are due at 8:30 AM ET.

Preliminary data showed Canada's economy likely grew by 0.1% in November.

In earnings news, CGI Inc (GIB.A.TO) reported first-quarter net earnings of $389.8 million, up 1.9% year-over-year.

The Canadian market ended modestly higher on Tuesday, despite exhibiting some weakness earlier in the session.

The early pullback on the day partly reflected profit taking, as traders cashed in on some of the recent strength in the market amid uncertainty ahead of Fed's monetary policy announcement on Wednesday.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index bounced off its early lows and into positive territory, closing up 27.81 points or 0.1% at 21,227.87, the highest closing level since April 2022.

Asian stocks ended weak on Wednesday as Chinese manufacturing data disappointed and caution prevailed ahead of the U.S. central bank's interest-rate decision later in the day.

European markets are quite subdued with investors digesting regional economic data and awaiting the monetary policy announcements from the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England. Weak earnings updates from Alphabet, Microsoft and AMD are weighing as well.

In commodities, West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures are down $0.84 or 1.1% at $76.98 a barrel.

Gold futures are gaining $5.30 or 0.26% at $2,056.20 an ounce, while Silver futures are up marginally at $23.230 an ounce.