By Fergal Smith
TORONTO (Reuters) – The Canadian dollar was little changed against its safe-haven U.S. counterpart on Thursday despite Wall Street tumbling on geopolitical worries, with investors sticking to bets that the Bank of Canada would hike interest rates multiple times in 2022.
The loonie was nearly unchanged at 1.2686 to the greenback, or 78.83 U.S. cents, after trading in a range of 1.2676 to 1.2734.
“The relationship between FX vol (volatility) and equity and bond market vol is just not what it used be,” said Mazen Issa, senior FX strategist at TD Securities.
“Have we really seen the market take out central bank pricing because of what’s happening in Ukraine? Not really.”
Money markets expect the BoC to hike on March 2 for the first time since October 2018 and six times in total this year.
U.S. stocks dropped, with investors gravitating toward defensive sectors and safe havens such as bonds and gold as geopolitical tensions heightened between Washington and Russia over Ukraine.
The price of oil, one of Canada’s major exports, settled 2% lower at $91.76 a barrel as talks to resurrect a nuclear deal with Iran entered their final stages which could unlock more crude supplies.
Domestic data showed that foreign investors bought a net C$37.56 billion in Canadian securities in December, led by new shares resulting from cross-border mergers and acquisitions.
Canadian government bond yields were lower across a flatter curve, tracking the move in U.S. Treasuries.
The 10-year eased 4.5 basis points to 1.914%, after touching on Wednesday its highest intraday level in three years at 1.995%.
(Reporting by Fergal Smith; Editing by Sandra Maler; Editing by Paul Simao)
