Toronto stock market tumbles
Posted Aug 8, 2011 10:12:04 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The Toronto stock market tumbled in early trading after Standard & Poor’s made the unprecedented move of downgrading the U.S. credit rating on government debt for the first time.
The S&P/TSX composite index fell 318.5 points to 11,843.7 as Friday’s downgrade added to worries about an underperforming U.S. economy and a worsening European debt crisis.
The Canadian dollar tumbled as nervous investors piled into U.S. Treasuries and precious metals, losing 0.92 of a cent to 101.32 cents.
They also sent gold prices surging, up past the US$1,700 level for the first time, surging $45.70 to US$1,697.50 an ounce. Earlier it had run as high as US$1,718.20.
But demand worries continued to push oil prices down, losing $3.31 to US$83.61 a barrel after falling about US$8 last week.
New York markets also fell heavily with the Dow Jones industrial average falling 185 points to 11,260. The Nasdaq composite index fell 54 points to 2,478 while the S&P 500 index fell 25 points to 1,175.
