The Canadian dollar rose against its US counterpart today due to the mixed US nonfarm payrolls. The loonie gained on other most-traded rivals as well, most likely thanks to the strong rally of crude oil prices. Domestic macroeconomic data did not help the currency, being rather underwhelming.
The official US employment report showed strong growth of employment, but other parts of the report were weak, with an unexpected rise of the unemployment rate and slowing wage inflation.
Prices for crude oil, Canada’s major export commodity, rallied strongly on Friday thanks to a range of supporting factors.
The headline seasonally adjusted IHS Markit Canada Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index edged down to 53.0 in January from 53.6 in December. While it was still safely above the neutral 50.0 level, the index showed the slowest expansion since December 2016.
Released yesterday, Canada’s gross domestic product demonstrated a drop by 0.1% in November from the previous month, matching forecasts, after increasing 0.3% in October. The Industrial Product Price Index fell 0.7% in December, dragged down by falling prices for energy and petroleum products, while analysts had expected an increase by 0.1%. The Raw Materials Price Index rose by 3.8%, in line with expectations, driven mainly by prices for crude energy products.
USD/CAD dropped from 1.3122 to 1.3092 as of 21:50 GMT today, and its session minimum of 1.3069 was the lowest since November 7. EUR/CAD declined from 1.5019 to 1.4994, retreating from the session maximum of 1.5082. CAD/JPY rallied from 82.92 to 83.61.
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