04:13 PM EST, 11/20/2024 (MT Newswires) -- The Toronto Stock Exchange rose for a third-straight session on Wednesday, pushed higher by commodity issues/

The S&P/TSX Composite Index closed up 25.69 points to 25.036.46, pushing closed to the Nov.14 record close of 25,049.67. Battery Metals, up 1.91%, and Energy, up 1.02%, were the biggest gainers, while Telecoms, down 0.57% and Utilities, down 0.27%, led declining sectors.

West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil closed lower as geopolitical tensions were outweighed by continuing weak demand and high supply. WTI crude oil for December delivery closed down US$0.52 to settle at US$68.87 per barrel, while January Brent crude, the global benchmark, closed down US$0.50 to US$72.81.

Gold traded higher late afternoon, climbing for a third day as increasing international tensions prompt safe-haven buying after the Biden Administration permitted Ukraine to fire U.S.-made missiles into Russia and Moscow responded by lowering its policy threshold for the use of nuclear weapons. Gold for December delivery was last seen up US$20.60 to US$2,651.60 per ounce.

BMO's Brian Belski, who published his 2025 Canadian Market Outlook on Tuesday, shared this overview on Canada's sectors:

"From our perspective, 2025 will once again be characterized by broadening equity performance that will be sector agnostic for the most part. As such, our sector weightings in 2025 will remain modest like in 2024. However, we believe investors should still tilt their allocation effect toward more cyclical areas and areas with improving momentum," Belski noted. "Yes, this means a little less contrarian from last year when we saw performance inflection toward yield names as the Bank of Canada started cutting interest rates. As such, we are downgrading our contrarian call, Communication Services to Market Weight from Overweight and Upgrading Real Estate to Overweight from Market Weight."

BMO is also downgrading Utilities to Underweight from Market Weight and Upgrading Industrials to Market Weight from Underweight.

"Financials is once again our largest Overweight," adds Belski. "This sector remains our only contrarian Overweight, which has seen improving performance momentum in the second half of 2024 and has strong income characteristics."