Strong buying interest in energy and financial stocks pushed the Toronto stock market to a solid gain Monday.
The S&P/TSX composite index closed up 87.01 points to 10,476.77 ahead of a shortened trading week in Canada and the United States.
The TSX energy sector was ahead 1.4 per cent as the August crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange moved up $2.33 (U.S.) to $71.49 a barrel.
The rise came amid a report from the International Energy Agency that it is cutting at least three million barrels a day from its oil demand forecasts for the coming five years.
But prices found support after Nigerian militants damaged and partly shut down an offshore oil platform belonging to Royal Dutch Shell PLC.
The financial sector was up 1.7 per cent.
The Canadian dollar moved down 0.19 of a cent to 86.45 cents.
The TSX Venture Exchange declined six points to 1,105.56.
The TSX built on a gain of just under 1 per cent last week. The market's main index closed Friday about 300 points shy of the 2009 high of 10,714 set on June 11, at which point the TSX had surged 41 per cent since the start of the spring rally.
But analysts think that the market is in for a second wind.
"I would think that once we see the second-quarter numbers, it will be 'are those green shoots actually emerging' - and probably they will be because we're going to have an inventory rebuild," said Gavin Graham, director of investments at BMO Asset Management.
"Now [investors]know the world isn't coming to an end, you need to rebuild them at least to a level that enables you to fulfill customer demand. And so that's going to give us a really good kicker in the second and third quarter."
However, after that he sees a lacklustre showing on markets as global economies work their way out of a serious recession.
"You've seen the forecasts from the people at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and the World Bank saying we're going to be growing next year and maybe it's going to be 1 per cent and that's quite frankly a pretty unimpressive rate of growth," added Mr. Graham.
Rising energy stocks also helped drive New York markets higher after both the Dow industrials and the S&P 500 lost ground last week.
The Dow Jones industrial average moved ahead 90.99 points, while the Nasdaq composite index climbed 5.84 points to 1,844.06 and the S&P 500 edged up 8.33 points to 927.23.
The trading week - shortened by Canada Day on Wednesday and by a U.S. holiday on Friday - will see key economic data that will give investors a better sense of where the economy is headed.
Statistics Canada will release April gross domestic product figures on Tuesday. Economists expect to see a contraction of 0.1 per cent on the month, following a 0.3 per cent dip in March.
And on Thursday, the U.S. government releases its June employment report. Investors are braced for the U.S. economy to shed 365,000 jobs during the month.
Outside of the energy, financial and utilities groups, performance was lacklustre in Toronto with declines led by a 0.7 per cent dip in the base metals sector, even as copper prices rose 1.9 cents to $2.3125 a pound.