The Canadian dollar was little changed against its U.S. counterpart on Friday as this week’s stronger-than-expected domestic data was offset by reduced investor appetite for risk.
U.S. stocks plunged in a broad sell-off as China and the United States traded their latest salvos in a prolonged trade war.
Canada exports many commodities, including oil, so its economy could be hurt by a slowdown in the flow of global trade.
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Data this week showed Canada retail sales in June and inflation in July both beat expectations.
“We are really struggling to see the Canadian dollar picking up benefit from this week’s data which has been quite significantly better than expected,” said Shaun Osborne, chief currency strategist at Scotiabank. “Some focus obviously on trade and risk aversion seems to be spilling over to the CAD to some extent.”
The Canadian dollar was trading nearly unchanged at 1.3296 to the greenback, or 75.21 U.S. cents at 4:23 p.m. ET. The currency was down 0.2 per cent for the week.
Meanwhile, the price of oil, one of Canada’s major exports fell on Friday on worsening trade tensions. U.S. crude oil futures settled 2.1 per cent lower at $54.17 a barrel.
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Canadian government bond prices were higher across the yield curve, with the two-year up 17.5 cents to yield 1.379 per cent and the 10-year rising 111 cents to yield 1.175 per cent.
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