TORONTO (Reuters) - The Toronto Stock Exchange's main index
retreated on Friday as softer commodity prices pulled down
energy and materials issues, while telecoms giant BCE
With U.S. markets closed, many Toronto traders started their weekend early, leading to thin volumes that accentuated the market's volatility, analysts said.
"America is closed. Whenever that happens, nothing much is going to happen in Canada," said Douglas Davis, president at Davis-Rea in Toronto.
The S&P/TSX composite index <.GSPTSE> fell 133.18 points, or 0.94 percent, to close at 14,010.39.
The decline would have been steeper if not for the sharp rise in shares of BCE. BCE climbed 12.8 percent after the company said its C$34.8 billion takeover by a group led by the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan would go ahead at the agreed C$42.75-per-share purchase price.
The stock has endured wide swings over the past year as investors wondered if the leveraged buyout would go through and at what price.
"I think this adds another notch in it that it's probably going to be done at C$42.75," said Sal Masionis, a stockbroker at Brant Securities. "If it wasn't for BCE, (the index) would be down quite a bit more."
BCE rose C$4.49 to C$39.64, leading the TSX telecoms subgroup up 5.36 percent.
But eight of the ten TSX groups fell during the session, including the materials and energy sectors, which account for about half of the index's weighting.
Energy stocks fell 1.77 percent, as oil prices fell more than a dollar per barrel. Materials issues slid 1.51 percent, as prices for both base and precious metals eased.
($1=$1.02 Canadian)
(Reporting by Cameron French; editing by Janet Guttsman)
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