By Commodity News Service Canada
Winnipeg, July 31 – The Canadian dollar was slightly lower on Thursday as Canadian economic growth figures came in better than expected, analysts say.
At 9:04 CDT Thursday morning, the loonie was down 0.06 of a cent of US$0.9167 or US$1 = C$1.0909 as Statistics Canada reported that gross domestic product grew by 0.4 per cent during July, which was better than the 0.3 per cent that economists had expected.
The U.S. currency strengthened against other currencies on Thursday amid interest rate concerns, traders say.
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The U.S. Federal Reserve finished its interest rate meeting on Wednesday and indicated that it will keep short-term interest rates low ‘for a considerable time’ after it most likely ends bond purchases in October. Markets had generally expected the Federal Reserve to start hiking interest rates in mid-2015, however much stronger than expected economic growth in the second quarter has investors worried that the Fed could hike rates sooner.
U.S. gross domestic product grew by an annual pace of four per cent in the second quarter after contracting 2.1 per cent in the January to March period due to severe winter weather.
The TSX lowered 55.25 points to 15,469.57 at 9:04 CDT Thursday morning.
