Canadian Market Up Firmly In Positive Territory

(RTTNews) - The Canadian market is up firmly in positive territory around mid afternoon on Thursday with stocks from across several sectors posting strong gains.

Technology, healthcare, real estate and financials shares are among the major gainers. Shares from utilities, industrials, consumer discretionary and communications sectors are also mostly up with solid gains.

The benchmark S&P/TSX Composite Index is up 220.44 points or 1.14% at 19,504.54.

Shopify Inc (SHOP.TO) is climbing more than 6%, while Air Canada (AC.TO) is up nearly 5%, Aurora Cannabis (ACB.TO) is gaining 3.5% and Canopy Growth Corp (WEED.TO) is rising 3%.

Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS.TO), Manulife Financial (MFC.TO), BlackBerry (BB.TO), Cenovus Energy (CVE.TO) and B2Gold Corp (BTO.TO) are up 1.2 to 2%.

Docebo Inc (DCBO.TO), Goeasy (GSY.TO), Onex Corporation (ONEX.TO), Cogeco Inc (CGO.TO), West Fraser Timber (WFG.TO), Magna International (MG.TO), CargoJet (CJT.TO) and Colliers International (CIGI.TO) are up 3 to 5.7%.

Precision Drilling Corporation (PD.TO), Kinaxis Inc (KXS.TO), Descartes Systems Group (DSG.TO), Constellation Software (CSU.TO), FirstService Corporation (FSV.TO) and Canadian Tire Corporation (CTC.A.TO) are gaining 1.5 to 2.3%.

In economic news, a report from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business showed the reading on small business sentiment in Canada increased to 50.9 points in December from 50.0 points in November.