By Commodity News Service Canada.
Winnipeg, August 28 – The Canadian dollar was lower against its US counterpart at midday Friday, pushed downward by declines in Canada’s raw materials price index.
The Canadian dollar was at US$0.7560 or US$1 = C$1.3323 at 11:45 CDT Friday.
A new report shows that Canada’s industrial product price index gained 0.7% in July. Trade analysts had predicted a flat reading heading into the report. The index tracks the prices Canadian manufacturers receive when their goods leave the plant.
Meantime, prices for raw materials used by Canadian companies, fell 5.9% in July.
However, crude oil was up 5.5% Friday morning which helped give some support to the dollar.
On the commodity markets the September crude contract in New York advanced US$2.33 to US$44.89 a barrel. The September gold contract advanced US$10.50 to US$1,133.00 an ounce.
At 11:45 CDT Friday, the Toronto Stock Exchange was up 73.93 points to 13,837.73.