TSX closes higher Friday to end rough week

Investing.com -- The Canadian stock market closed higher Friday as investors gauged President Donald Trump’s tariff policies and February’s U.S. and Canada jobs reports came in.  U.S. stocks got a boost mid-day after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the U.S. economy is in a good place, which helped ease investors’ mood.

The S&P/TSX 60 index closed up 10 points, or 0.7%. The S&P/TSX Composite closed up 56 points, or 0.7%. Throughout the day, the indexes fluctuated wildly between plus and negative territory before gaining traction in afternoon trade.

Despite Friday’s bounce, Canadian stocks had their worst week in nearly 18 months due to trade worries.  Economists are now predicting a possible recession in Canada and maybe the U.S.  BMO (TSX:BMO) Capital’s Chief Economist, Douglas Porter, lowered GDP growth targets in the U.S. and cut them deeply in Canada while raising inflation expectations for both economies.  "It’s not a friendly combination, with recession risks palpable for Canada, but now also present even for the U.S. economy," Porter said.

On Friday, U.S. president Donald Trump made remarks in the Oval Office that reciprocal tariffs on Canada for dairy and lumber were coming soon.

Friday’s report revealed that the Canadian labor market remained mostly steady, adding only 1,100 jobs, significantly lower than the consensus expectation of 20,000 new jobs.

Meanwhile, the U.S. economy added 151,000 jobs, up from January’s 125,000, but missing economist expectations of 159,000 new jobs.

Trump temporarily suspended levies on most goods coming from Canada and Mexico until April 2 on Thursday, reversing a decision days earlier to allow the duties to come into effect because of a perceived lack of action by these countries to help stem the flow of illegal drugs and migrants into the U.S.

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Trump’s approach to trade relations with Canada and Mexico -- the two biggest U.S. trading partners -- has whipsawed since his return to office, clouding the outlook for the highly-integrated North American economy. In February, Trump slapped 25% tariffs on non-energy Canadian goods and all Mexican products, but later delayed them for 30 days.

U.S. stocks end the week higher after a rough week

U.S. stocks closed solidly higher Friday, bouncing after the not-to-hot-not-to-cold February’s jobs report and the sanguine comments from Powell.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 222 points or 0.5%, S&P 500 gained 28 points or 0.5%, and NASDAQ Composite rose 127 points, or 0.7%.

Crude gains, but set for weekly losses

Oil prices rose, but were on track for their biggest weekly decline since October, as a murky outlook around U.S. tariff policy mingled with an anticipated output increase from major producers.

At 4:20 PM ET, Brent futures increased by 1.3% to $70.36 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures rose 1.1% to $67.07 a barrel.

However, for the week, Brent is down over 4%, set for its largest weekly decline since the week of October 14. WTI is set to drop almost 5%, also its biggest weekly fall since that week.

Gold falls

At 4:20 PM ET, Gold prices were down 0.3% as the U.S. dollar lingered near a four-month low amid the ongoing trade policy uncertainty.  Gold is up 35% over the last year.

(Scott Kanowsky also contributed to this article)

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