* Canadian dollar at C$1.4096 or 70.94 U.S. cents
* Bond prices lower across the maturity curve
By Fergal Smith
TORONTO, Jan 8 (Reuters) - The Canadian dollar held its own
against a broadly stronger U.S. dollar on Friday after domestic
and U.S. data both showed solid jobs growth, while a rebound in
China's major stock indexes helped sentiment and crude oil
prices rose.
Canada added a greater-than-expected 22,800 jobs in
December, in part making up for heavy losses in the previous
month, while the unemployment rate stayed at 7.1 percent.
"The story of resilient Canadian job markets generally
continues, but I think the underlying details were much softer
than the headline on this one," said Derek Holt, vice president
of economics at Scotiabank.
Meanwhile, U.S. job growth surged in December and employment
for the prior two months was revised sharply higher, suggesting
that a recent manufacturing-led slowdown in economic growth
would be temporary.
Helping Chinese stocks, Beijing ditched a circuit breaker
mechanism that halted trading twice this week and the People's
Bank of China raised its guidance rate for the yuan for the
first time in nine trading days.
At 9:21 a.m. EST (1421 GMT), the Canadian dollar CAD=D4
was trading at C$1.4096 to the greenback, or 70.94 U.S. cents,
little changed from the Bank of Canada's official close of
$1.4097, or 70.94 U.S. cents.
The currency's strongest level of the session was C$1.4058,
while its weakest level was C$1.4127. On Thursday, it hit its
weakest since July 2003 of C$1.4170.
Against the euro, the Canadian dollar firmed to C$1.5330. It
hit C$1.5433 on Thursday, its weakest since Aug. 25 last year.
U.S. crude CLc1 prices were up 0.15 percent at $33.32 a
barrel, while Brent crude LCOc1 added 0.39 percent to
$33.88. O/R
Canadian government bond prices were lower across the
maturity curve on the solid jobs data and reduced safe-haven
demand, with the two-year CA2YT=RR price down 6.5 Canadian
cents to yield 0.45 percent and the benchmark 10-year
CA10YT=RR falling 25 Canadian cents to yield 1.351 percent.
The Canada-U.S. two-year bond spread was 1.6 basis points
narrower at -56.1 basis points, while the 10-year spread was 0.5
of a basis point narrower at -82.4 basis points as Canadian
government bonds underperformed.
(Editing by Bernadette Baum)