TSX hit by soft earnings, oil price drop

Wed Oct 28, 3:04 PM
TORONTO (Reuters) - Toronto's main stock index was lower on Wednesday morning, hit by soft corporate earnings and by a drop in oil prices that shook EnCana Corp and its energy peers, extending a recent slide in the oil and gas sector.
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(Reuters)

By Frank Pingue

TORONTO (Reuters) - Toronto's main stock index was lower on Wednesday morning, hit by soft corporate earnings and by a drop in oil prices that shook EnCana Corp and its energy peers, extending a recent slide in the oil and gas sector.

Suncor Energy shares fell 1 percent to C$36.57, while EnCana followed with a drop of 1.4 percent to C$61.37.

The energy sector has fallen in the past three sessions. Oil prices dropped to $79 a barrel on Wednesday after hitting a one-year high last week of $82 a barrel.

The lower start to the TSX followed weakness in equities overnight and came as a number of companies reported soft earnings for the latest quarter.

Shares of Nexen Inc dropped 1.3 percent to C$23.67 after Canada's fourth-largest independent oil explorer said its third-quarter profit fell 86 percent.

Open Text Corp shares tumbled 5 percent to C$40.31 after the business software maker posted an 88 percent drop in quarterly profit.

"It really just seems to be a continuation of a good three-day selloff," said Francis Campeau, broker at MF Global Canada in Montreal. "It seems a bit overdone on the sell side ... but guys are still taking risk off the table."

At 9:55 a.m., the S&P/TSX composite index was down 84.75 points, or 0.77 percent, at 11,968.79.

($1=$1.07 Canadian)

(Editing by Peter Galloway)