Canada's main stock market fell for a second consecutive session Tuesday, after commodities like copper traded at multi-year lows amid concerns triggered by a sharp sell-off in Chinese stock market.
Toronto Stock Exchange's benchmark Standard & Poor's/TSX Composite Index dropped 57.66 points or 0.40 percent to 14,193.87 points, the lowest in three weeks.
The miners and energy producers that make up about one-third of the TSX index led losses as metals prices plunged to levels last seen in 2009 amid signs China's economy is weakening further. China is the world's biggest consumer of commodities and Canada's second-largest trading partner.
Metals and mining sector took the biggest hit Tuesday, down 5. 73 percent, with First Quantum Minerals sinking 9.3 percent and Teck Resources, the biggest diversified miner in Canada, sliding 8 percent.
Gold stocks were also under pressure, as Iamgold shed 5.4 percent and Yamana Gold gave back 5.3 percent.
Industrials and utilities were also in negative territory as Emera Inc. lost 2 percent and ATCO Ltd. shed 1.4 percent.
Telecom sector provided the only one bright spot, as Rogers Communications gained 37 cents, or 0.8 percent, to 45.68 Canadian dollars.
Bombardier Inc. was the most actively traded stock, losing 10 cents, or 7.6 percent, to 1.21 Canadian dollars, on 13.5 million shares. Bombardier slumped for the fourth day. The stock has plunged 71 percent this year and is the second-worst performing stock in the S&P/TSX ahead of Trican Well Service Ltd.
The New York Dow Jones industrial average ended the day down 33. 84 points at 17,511.34, while the Nasdaq fell 32.35 points to 5, 059.35 and the S&P 500 declined 5.52 points to 2,096.92.
On commodity markets, the September crude oil contract ended trading up 75 cents at 42.62 U.S. dollars a barrel, while September natural gas lost 2.4 cents to end at 2.704 U.S. dollars per thousand cubic feet.
Copper led a slide in commodities amid concern that the global fuel glut still persists. The decline came a week after China's first major currency devaluation since 1994 surprised global investors and fueled concern that authorities are struggling to combat a slowdown in the world's second-largest economy.
September copper gave back 3.4 cents to 2.287 U.S. dollars a pound and the December gold contract fell 1.50 to 1,116.90 dollars an ounce.
The Canadian dollar Thursday went up to 0.7651 U.S. dollar, compared with 0.7642 U.S. dollar Monday.
