(RTTNews) - Canadian stocks stayed on the winning track Tuesday, extending the new year’s strong gains as miners rose on inflated metals prices. Toronto’s main index reached its highest level in seven weeks with its sixth straight positive session.

The S&P/TSX Composite Index finished up 186.58 points up 2.01% to 9,472.09. This marks its highest finish since Nov. 10.

Mining stocks soared another 10.2% and are now up more than 30% in the last three sessions. The move comes amid rapidly rising industrial metal prices. Copper for March delivery finished at $1.583 a pound, up 12.4 cents, and earlier hit a monthly high of $1.585.

Among the big gainers of the day, FNX Mining (FNX.TO) added 17.7%, Inmet (INM.TO) rose 16.7% and Thompson Creek Metals (TCM.TO) surged 9%.

Financials added 3.6% as all of the big six banks finished higher. The Bank of Montreal (BMO.TO) is up 6.5%, National Bank (NA.TO) added 5.75% and CIBC (CM.TO) jumped 5.1%.

Tech stocks surged 2.75%, led by a 10.2% jump for MDA (MDA.TO). Research in Motion (RIM.TO) soared 6.56%. Biovail (BVF.TO) climbed 1.9% as healthcare stocks added 2.7%.

Energy stocks finished up 1.6% as crude oil closed modestly higher after earlier topping $50. Light sweet crude for February delivery rose to $49.11, up 30 cents on the day.

Calfrac (CFW.TO) has surged 12.2%, Enerplus (ERF.UN.TO) gained 7.3% and Nuvista (NVA.TO) added 7.2%.

NovaGold (NG.TO) finished up 13.36% at $4.46 per share, after earlier reaching as high as $2.99. The Gold Index added 1.8%.

In corporate news, Rogers Communications (RCI.TO) dropped 4.5% after the company released its preliminary fourth quarter subscriber statistics, indicating a decline in cable subscriber additions. The Telecommunications Index is up 0.85%.

On the economic front, Canadian industrial product prices fell 2.6% in December. Economists expected a much more modest decline of 0.9 percent. Raw materials prices fell 13.4%, compared to the 9% drop predicted by experts.

South of the border, the Institute for Supply Management released its December report on activity in the services sector. The index of activity in the sector rose notably to 40.6, while analysts expected a slight decline to 37.0 from a record low reading of 37.3 in November.

At the same time, the government issued its report on November factory orders, showing a decline of 4.6 percent following a revised 6.0 percent decrease in October. Factory orders were expected to decline 2.6 percent in November.

Similarly, weakness was also seen in the pending home sales report that was released by the National Association of Realtors. Pending home sales fell by 4 percent in November after a decline of 0.7 percent in October. Analysts expected pending sales to have fallen 1.0 percent.

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Posted in Categories: Canada, Releases, Stocks.

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