TORONTO - The Canadian dollar was little changed Monday morning amid higher commodity prices while traders awaited the latest snapshot of economic growth. The loonie inched up 0.01 of a cent to 97.35 cents US. Economists expect Statistics Canada to report Wednesday that gross domestic product grew by 0.3 per cent during May. Commodity prices were positive as the September crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange climbed 59 cents to US$105.29 a barrel. September copper edged up a penny to US$3.11 a pound while August bullion rose $13 to US$1,334.50 an ounce. Markets also looked to a raft of U.S. economic data coming out this week. Pending home sales data was to be released later Monday morning. Traders also awaited second quarter U.S. GDP data being released Wednesday, the non-farm payrolls report for July on Friday and a scheduled announcement on interest rates Wednesday by the U.S. Federal Reserve. Markets are particularly interested in any indication from the Fed on tapering its monthly US$85 billion of bond purchases, which have kept long term rates low and fuelled a rally on equity markets. Expectations for the U.S. growth data are muted, largely due to the effects of the sequestration, a series of across the board U.S. government spending cuts worth US$85 billion that took effect March 1. The consensus calls for the economy to have grown by one per cent during the second quarter as sequestration concerns undercut business spending. On Friday, the U.S. Labour Department is expected to report the economy cranked out about 190,000 jobs during July. Canadian labour data for July won't released until August 9.

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