TORONTO (Reuters) – Call it renewed appreciation for literary classics or merely further evidence of Hollywood shying away from unproven material, but this year’s Toronto Film Festival slate is heavy with literary adaptations, some of which may make a splash during Oscar season.

“Cloud Atlas,” and “Silver Linings Playbook,” both based on recent best-sellers, are among the most eagerly anticipated titles set to unspool at the festival, which is considered part of the opening bell for the Hollywood awards season.

TORONTO, July 29 (Reuters) – A sluggish stock market is
hitting Canada’s life insurers with a double whammy, as this
week’s quarterly reports from Manulife Financial Corp
and its competitors will once again demonstrate to the chagrin
of their shareholders.

Manulife, Canada’s largest life insurer, will likely post a
loss for the second quarter, while its two main competitors -
Great-West Lifeco Inc and Sun Life Financial Inc
– look set to report lower profits, in part because of
the weakness of financial markets during the reporting period.

TORONTO (Reuters) – The Toronto International Film Festival promises a heavy dose of popcorn movies on a slate normally noted for Oscar contenders, opening with time-travel thriller “Looper” and featuring premieres of films directed by Ben Affleck, Robert Redford and Tom Twyker.

Opening on September 6 and widely considered a kick-off to Hollywood’s Oscar season, the 37th edition of the festival will feature films starring Ryan Gosling, Tom Hanks and Robert De Niro, as well as Dustin Hoffman’s directorial debut and many movies from India.

TORONTO, July 5 (Reuters) – Home sales in two of Canada’s
biggest markets slowed sharply in June from the year before,
offering more evidence that the country’s lengthy real estate
boom is softening.

Sales in Toronto, Canada’s largest city, slumped 13 percent
from June 2011, the Toronto Real Estate Board said on Thursday.

TORONTO, June 21 (Reuters) – Canada’s decision to further
tighten mortgage rules to cool the domestic housing market will
likely further slow revenue growth at the country’s big banks,
although some lenders were quick to welcome the changes on
Thursday.

Designed to put the brakes on soaring Canadian personal debt
levels fed by rock-bottom interest rates, the new rules should
slow the issuance of new mortgages, adding to the challenge of
slowing loan growth that is already impacting their core
domestic branch-banking businesses.

TORONTO, June 17 (Reuters) – For Canadian banks, slowing
domestic loan growth and narrowing lending margins threaten the
double-digit profit gains that have become routine in recent
quarters, adding to the generalized pressure being exerted on
the sector by Europe’s debt crisis.

The slowdown has arrived at a particularly inopportune time
for the Canadian banks as the euro crisis threatens to roil bank
stocks around the globe. Rather than flocking to Canada’s
conservative banking sector – often described as the world’s
soundest – some equity investors may instead gravitate to U.S.
lenders, which may have a higher upside when markets eventually
recover.

TORONTO, June 11 (Reuters) – Talking about Toronto’s condo
craze has become something of a sport for residents of Canada’s
largest city, where soaring real estate prices and a forest of
construction cranes have fed speculation of a real estate
bubble.

But the big question is how much of the market is fueled by
cash-rich foreign investors, and whether they, seeking to
capitalize on more than a decade of rising prices, are
preventing the market from a soft landing.

TORONTO (Reuters) – Laurentian Bank of Canada’s (LB.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) B2B Trust subsidiary will acquire AGF Trust Co from mutual fund company AGF Management (AGFb.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) for C$415.5 million ($402.1 million), in a deal the bank said will boost its income and increase efficiencies.

The bank, Canada’s eighth-largest, announced the transaction on Wednesday as it reported a stronger-than-expected 9 percent rise in second-quarter net income and raised its quarterly dividend by 4 percent.

TORONTO, June 6 (Reuters) – Canadian miner Kinross Gold
said on Wednesday that workers at its Tasiast gold mine
in Mauritania in West Africa have initiated an unlawful work
stoppage, halting mining and processing activity at the
operation.

Kinross spokesman Steve Mitchell said mining and processing
workers failed to report to work on Monday. About 600 workers
are involved, although not all are on the same shift, he said.
Most are unionized.

TORONTO, June 1 (Reuters) – RBC Capital Markets expects to
snatch some U.S. business away from retreating European
investment banks, but the Royal Bank of Canada
subsidiary doesn’t plan to make big acquisitions or enter new
markets, executives said on Friday.

The investment bank, a wholly-owned unit of Canada’s largest
bank, has aggressively grown the business since the 2008
financial crisis, and was one of the top ten global investment
banks in the world in the first quarter, as measured by fees.