Canadian Market Likely To Open On Negative Note On Recession Fears

(RTTNews) - Sharply lower Canadian and U.S. futures point to a weak opening on Bay Street on Thursday. Fears of a possible recession due to aggressive monetary tightening by global central banks triggered a sell-off in European markets and the trend is unlikely to be any different in the Canadian market this morning.

After five successive days of losses, the Canadian market ended modestly higher on Wednesday, led by gains in healthcare, technology and consumer discretionary sectors.

After opening on a firm note, the market pared some gains and moved slightly above the unchanged line till around mid afternoon when it briefly slipped into the red after the Fed announced a 75-basis point interest rate hike.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index ended with a gain of 63.05 points or 0.32% at 19,611.56, after scaling a low of 19,383.69 and a high of 19,743.36 intraday.

Asian stocks gave up early gains to end mixed on Thursday amid concerns that higher U.S. interest rates could lead to more capital outflows from emerging markets. Investors also continued to fret about the impact of surging inflation on economic growth and corporate earnings.

European stocks are down sharply amid mounting fears that the Fed might trigger a recession sometime in the next year with its aggressive rate action.

The Bank of England today raised its key interest rate for the fifth straight session on Thursday, as inflationary pressures intensified amid the labor market tightness. The bank has raised the rate by a total 1.15 percentage points since December.

In commodities trading, West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures are down $2.28 or 1.98% at $113.03 a barrel.

Gold futures are gaining $4.20 or 0.23% at $1,823.80 an ounce, while Silver futures are down $0.030 or 0.14% at $21.390 an ounce.