By Commodity News Service Canada
Winnipeg, March 13 – The Canadian dollar was lower against its American counterpart at midday Friday, as falling oil prices and a lukewarm job report sent the loonie to a six-year low.
The loonie was at US$0.7819 or US$1 = C$1.2789 at 11:45 CDT Friday morning.
The country is starting to show the effects of lingering weak oil prices as the Canadian economy lost 1,000 jobs in February. The number of unemployed people grew by 50,000. The unemployment rate also rose by 0.2 of a percentage point.
The International Energy Agency is reporting US oil production actually increased by 115,000 barrels a day in February.
On the commodity markets the April crude contract in New York fell 1.79 to US$45.26 a barrel. The April gold contract fell US$0.50 to US$1,151.40 an ounce. The May copper contract was unchanged at US$2.66 a pound.
At 11:45 CDT Friday morning, the Toronto Stock Exchange was down 150.30 points to 14,620.86.
