Canada’s dollar strengthened through par with the greenback after European leaders agreed to measures for containing the region’s debt crisis, sparking a rally in riskier assets including commodity-linked assets. The currency rose to the highest versus the greenback in more than a month. It fell relative to most of its major counterparts after the Bank of Canada cut its forecast this week for the nation’s economic growth. “The positive reaction to the European deal is the overriding factor in the appreciation of all currencies against the U.S. dollar,” said Jack Spitz, managing director of foreign exchange at National Bank of Canada in Toronto, in a telephone interview. “There’s a lot of enthusiasm right now in the market, but the reality check is going to hit at some point.” Canada’s currency climbed as much as 1 percent to 99.42 cents per U.S. dollar, the strongest level since Sept. 21, and traded at 99.54 cents, up 0.9 percent, at 8:01 a.m. in Toronto. One Canadian dollar buys $1.0046. European leaders meeting yesterday for the second time in four days persuaded bondholders to take 50 percent losses on Greek debt and boosted the firepower of a rescue fund for indebted nations to 1 trillion euros ($1.4 trillion), responding to global pressure to step up the fight against the financial crisis. Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 2.2 percent. Crude oil, Canada’s biggest export, climbed 2.9 percent. To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Fournier in Halifax, Nova Scotia at cfournier3@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dave Liedtka at dliedtka@bloomberg.net

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