A day after climbing to a record high, the Canadian market retreated as stocks tumbled on Thursday, due largely to a slew of disappointing earnings updates, and concerns about the outlook for growth following a batch of weak economic data from the U.S. and Europe.
Shares from energy, materials, technology, financials and industrials sectors were among the major losers.
The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index ended at 22,723.21, down 387.60 points or about 1.7%, the biggest single session drop in about 5-1/2 months.
The Information Technology Capped Index dropped 3.38%. The Energy Capped Index ended nearly 3% down, and the Materials Capped Index drifted down 2%. The Industrials and Financials Indexes lost 1.74% and 1.62%, respectively.
Cenovus Energy (CVE.TO), Baytex Energy (BTE.TO), Veren (V.TO), Bitfarms (BITF.TO) and Shopify Inc (SHOP.TO) ended down 4.6 to 5.9%.
Manulife Financial (MFC.TO), Suncor Energy (SU.TO) and Air Canada (AC.TO) closed lower by 2.6 to 3.1%. Bank of Montreal (BMO.TO), Royal Bank of Canada (RY.TO), Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD.TO) and Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ.TO) lost 1 to 1.5%.
On the economic front, the S&P Global Canada Manufacturing PMI fell to 47.8 in July 2024, down from 49.3 in June, indicating the sharpest contraction in operating conditions since December and extending the current period of decline to 15 months.