S&P/TSX composite finishes higher, U.S. stocks also gain

Hamilton Spectator

10-07-2025

TORONTO - Strength in the industrials sector helped Canada's main stock index finish higher, while U.S. markets also rose.
The S&P/TSX composite index was up 109.98 points at 27,082.30.
In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 192.34 points at 44,650.64. The S&P 500 index was up 17.20 points at 6,280.46, while the Nasdaq composite was up 19.33 points at 20,630.66. The S&P 500 rose 0.3 per cent, inching past the record it set last week.
'It is interesting because you're seeing the markets hit all-time highs, and it's continuing to push that way,' Ian Chong, portfolio manager for First Avenue Investment Counsel Inc., said in an interview.
He added that over the past few days, tech has performed well, with some select names continuing to perform, highlighting Nvidia topping a US$4 trillion market cap.
'But technology itself isn't really one of the strong performing sectors of the day ... you're seeing a bit of a rotation into some of the laggards of the first half of the year,' Chong said.
The market has been steadying following a downbeat start to the week as the U.S. President Donald Trump's administration renewed its push to use threats of higher tariffs on goods imported into the U.S. in hopes of securing new trade agreements with countries around the globe.
Wednesday had been initially set as a deadline by Trump for countries to make deals with the U.S. or face heavy increases in tariffs. But with just two trade deals announced since April, one with the United Kingdom and one with Vietnam, the window for negotiations has now been extended to Aug. 1. That's given Wall Street a breather just in time for the start of corporate earnings season.
'It seems like the tariff risks are currently on hold, given the extension to Aug. 1, so there's some optimism in the market that more trade deals could be announced before then,' Chong said.
Most of the sectors in the S&P 500 were up, with banks and consumer-focused companies accounting for much of the gains. JPMorgan rose 1.4 per cent.
'We've got U.S. banks kicking off the reporting season next week on Tuesday ... So we'll get some good data points there. I believe that they should be fairly resilient banking results coming in, like large money centres including JPMorgan who's kicking it off on July 15, should be relatively strong,' Chong said.
Overall, he said moves on the TSX generally follow the S&P 500 closely, highlighting a strong correlation between the two indexes.
'Industrials has been a very strong sector for Canada. It's catching a very strong bid on a lot of these manufacturing names that relate to infrastructure builds, or even defence, such as Bombardier, MDA Space, and WSP. Some of these names have just done exceptionally well,' Chong said.
Elsewhere in Canadian markets, shares of Cineplex Inc. gained 1.87 per cent Thursday as the movie theatre company reported its box office revenue for June totalled $51.8 million, marking the first quarter since 2019 that it topped $50 million in each month.
The Canadian dollar traded for 73.08 cents US compared with 73.03 cents US on Wednesday.
The August crude oil contract was down US$1.81 at US$66.57 per barrel.
The August gold contract was up US$4.70 at US$3,325.7 an ounce.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 10, 2025.
— With files from The Associated Press.
Companies in this story: (TSX:GSPTSE, TSX:CADUSD, TSX:CGX)