Business
Investors in selling mood
Investors in selling mood
About this update from Defence Therapeutics Inc Class A
[{"type":"text","content":"\nInvestors in selling mood\n\nEarnings, jobless figures factor in\n Feb. 5, 2009 (Baystreet.ca) -- 10:28 am EST\nInvestors saw their mood turn a little blue at the outset Thursday, with markets on both sides of the border losing ground. The S&P TSX Composite Index subsided 62.73 points in the first half-hour, to 8,630.36. Bombardier Inc., the world's third- largest maker of commercial aircraft, plans to cut 1,360 jobs, or 4.5% of its workforce, as deliveries of business jets are projected to drop this year. Demand has weakened for its Learjet and Challenger planes, which led to the job-cut decision. Research In Motion Ltd. won Certicom Corp.'s support for its $131 million bid for the Canadian software maker, boosting its chances of winning a takeover battle against VeriSign Inc. Research In Motion's $3 a share offer is "superior" and VeriSign has until Feb. 11 to amend its $2.10 bid. Certicom had already accepted VeriSign's offer. RIM, the maker of the BlackBerry e-mail phone, would use Certicom's encryption software to make its transmissions more secure.Domtar Corp., North America's largest maker of office paper, said its fourth-quarter loss widened to $676 million as it reduced production capacity to contend with falling paper demand. The per-share net loss of $1.31 compares with a year-earlier loss of $26 million, or five cents a share, Montreal-based Domtar said today in a statement. The loss excluding one-time items was four cents a share. On that basis, analysts expected profit of six cents, the average of 15 estimates in a Bloomberg survey.On the economic front, Canada's 2009 budget will generate stimulus of $32 billion over two years for the world's eighth-largest economy, about one-fifth less than the level estimated by the government, the head of Parliament's budget office said today. Kevin Page told lawmakers the Canadian government's estimate of a $40 billion stimulus from its budget over the next two years is a "maximum or gross" projection. The Canadian dollar advanced 0.20 cents to $81.37 cents U.S.BAYSTREET\n \nOf the 13 TSX sub-groups, 10 were listing downward, weighed down by energy, off 1.8%, industrials, down 1.6%, and health-care stocks, off 1.3%. The three gainers were gold, ahead 2.1%, materials, up 1.5%, and consumer staples, picking up 1.1%. The TSX Venture Exchange was up 4.28 p...