Bay Street Likely To Open On Subdued Note; U.S. Jobs Data In Focus

(RTTNews) - Canadian are likely to open on a somewhat subdued note on Thursday with the focus on a slew of data from the U.S. and Canada. The volume of business may remain thin as the U.S. market will close early today and remain shut on Friday for Independence Day holiday.

Canadian trade data, U.S. non-farm payroll report & unemployment data, jobless claims data, and reports on U.S. manufacturing and services sector activity will be in focus.

Hut 8 Corp. (HUT.TO), through its joint venture Far North Power Corp. with Macquarie Equipment Finance Ltd., has secured five-year capacity contracts for all four of its Ontario-based natural gas-fired power plants.

The contracts, awarded by the Ontario Independent Electricity System Operator or IESO through its Medium-Term 2 (MT2) auction, offer a weighted average capacity payment of approximately CAD $530 per MW-business day in the first year, with partial inflation indexing, the company said.

The Canaian market climbed to a fresh record high on Wednesday despite weaker domestic manufacturing data and US private sector jobs data. Investors largely focused on the ongoing US-Canada trade talks.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index reached an intraday high of 26,893.78 just an hour before the closing bell and managed to settle at 26,869.66, up by 12.55 or 0.05%.

Asian shares ended mixed on Thursday as investors reacted to a U.S.-Vietnam trade deal and awaited the monthly U.S. non-farm payroll data later in the day for directional cues.

European stocks are slightly higher with the U.K. market outperforming amid easing political concerns. Investors, digesting the data on regional manufacturing and services sector activity, are also closely following the developments on the trade front.

In commodities trading, West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures are roughly flat at $67.50 a barrel.

Gold futures are down $3.10 or 0.11% at $3,356.60 an ounce, while Silver futures are up $0.333 or 0.91% at $37.060 an ounce.