Canadian Dollar Gains Versus Greenback as Stocks and Copper Increase

Canada’s dollar gained against its U.S. counterpart for a second day as stocks rose and copper climbed on speculation near-zero U.S. interest rates will buoy demand for industrial metals.

The loonie, as the currency is nicknamed, strengthened against 11 of its 16 most-traded currencies, even as crude oil, Canada’s biggest export, fell to an eight-week low. Bonds rose as the Canadian dollar traded stronger than parity with the greenback for the 23rd straight day, the longest period since December 2007.

“Even though oil prices have been coming off and retreating, it hasn’t really affected the Canadian dollar to any degree,” said Michael O’Neill, managing director at Knightsbridge Foreign Exchange Inc. in Toronto. “The trend for Canada is still up in dollar-Canada.”

Canada’s currency rose as much as 0.2 percent before trading at 99.34 cents per U.S. dollar at 5:06 p.m. in New York, from 99.40 cents yesterday. One Canadian dollar buys $1.0063.

The loonie reached a two-year high against the dollar on Jan. 18 and has gained about 0.4 percent of its value against the greenback since the start of the year.

Copper Rise

Copper futures for March delivery advanced as much as 1.7 percent to $4.343 a pound on the Comex in New York. Crude oil for March delivery fell 1.9 percent to $85.68 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and the MSCI World Index each gained 0.2 percent.

“The dollar is range-bound for now,” said John Curran, senior vice president of fixed income at CanadianForex Ltd., an online foreign-exchange dealer in Toronto. “Nothing is going to make us get out of this one-cent range until we get some fresh economic data and that’s not happening until Monday.”

Statistics Canada will release gross domestic product data for November on Jan. 31. GDP is expected to have climbed 0.2 percent in November from the previous month, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg survey of three economists.

The yield on Canada’s benchmark 10-year note fell four basis points, or 0.04 percentage point, to 3.27 percent. The price of the 3.5 percent bond due in June 2020 rose 30 cents to C$101.80.