TSX slips as miners, energy weakness weighs

TORONTO (Reuters) - Canadian stocks moved lower on Tuesday, weighed down by a drop in gold mining and energy shares, as bullion and oil dipped and investors brushed off a Greek debt deal to focus on a looming U.S. fiscal crisis.

Bombardier Inc jumped 8.3 percent to C$3.38 after the planemaker signed a $7.8 billion deal to supply business jets to a private Swiss charter operator.

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd slid 6.9 percent to C$11.07 after rising sharply since mid-month on optimism over its upcoming new devices.

Meanwhile, resource stocks that play a major role in the overall direction of the index were broadly lower, with the biggest drag coming from Goldcorp Inc , which slipped 1.5 percent to C$40.18.

'People generally feel that gold is going higher, but the stocks suffer on an ongoing basis because ... it's so easy to buy the commodity,' said Paul Harris, a portfolio manager at Avenue Investment Management, which manages $280 million.

Gold eased after U.S. consumer confidence rose to a four-and-a-half-year high in November and a Fed policymaker expressed concern about easing measures. Oil edged lower as global growth concerns offset an agreement over Greek debt.

After 12 hours of talks at their third meeting in as many weeks, Greece's international lenders agreed on a package of measures to reduce its debt by 40 billion euros.

'Maybe some people were expecting more positive news on Greece and so they sold off after it happened,' Harris said.

Attention will likely now turn more decidedly to the U.S. Congress, where politicians are haggling over how to solve the country's fiscal crisis while avoiding a 'fiscal cliff' of steep tax increases and spending cuts.

By 10:56 a.m. (1556 GMT) the Toronto Stock Exchange's S&P/TSX composite index <.GSPTSE> was down 33.67 points, or 0.28 percent, at 12,151.49.

(Reporting by Alastair Sharp; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson and Jeffrey Benkoe)



This news article is brought to you by ANIMALS AND PETS - where latest news are our top priority.