The Daily Chase: Jobs day in the U.S. and Canada

Here are five things you need to know this morning:

Canada adds jobs, but jobless rate keeps inching higher: Canada’s economy added more than 22,000 jobs last month, Statistics Canada reported this morning. Although the figure was in line with expectations, as has been the case for several months in a row now, it fell well short of the growth of the country’s working–age population. As a result, the jobless rate ticked up two percentage points to 6.6 per cent. Outside of the pandemic surge in early 2020, that’s the highest level since May 2017. The Canadian jobs picture stands in stark contrast to the one in the U.S., where the economy added 142,000 jobs last month, pushing the jobless rate down to 4.2 per cent.

Inconvenient offer: Japan’s Seven & i Holdings has officially rejected Alimentation Couche-Tard’s offer to take over the 7-Eleven chain, calling the US$39 billion bid insufficient. It’s hardly an unexpected move after the company didn’t exactly give TSX-listed Couche-Tard’s initial proposal last month a warm reception. But while the company said the offer as tabled is “opportunistically timed” and “grossly undervalues” the company, the Japanese firm did leave the door open to a sweetened bid, saying it is “open to sincerely consider any proposal that is in the best interests of … shareholders.” Montreal-based Couche-Tard made an offer of about $14.86 per share for the company last month, a valuation that was about 21 per cent higher than what the market said it was worth at the time, but below what it was worth in February.

China complains to WTO about Canada’s EV tariffs: China has launched a formal complaint at the World Trade Organization about Canada’s decision last week to slap a 100 per cent tariff on Chinese-made electric vehicles and a 25 per cent levy on steel and aluminum. China says Canada’s plan, set to be implemented next month, is nothing less than trade protectionism which distorts global supply chains. It urges Canada to withdraw the tariffs.

Oil trading below US$70: The price of a barrel of the North American crude oil benchmark known as WTI is trading below US$70 for the first time this year, as weak macroeconomic data out of China and the U.S. is softening demand. The most active crude future contract is changing hands at just over $69 this morning, barely above the $68 or so it troughed at back in December. Yesterday, the oil cartel known as OPEC delayed planned production hikes by two months in a bid to raise the floor on prices.

BRP shares under pressure: Shares in TSX-listed BRP Inc. will be one to watch today as the jetski and skidoo maker slashed its earnings forecast almost in half. The company says it now expects full-year earnings per share to come in a range of between $2.75 and $3.25. That’s down from $6-$7 previously and well below the $6.23 analysts are expecting. National Bank analyst Martin Landry said the “extreme volatility … could spook investors.” The shares are down almost eight per cent in premarket trading this morning.