TORONTO – The Canadian dollar advanced Monday as the American greenback weakened against a variety of currencies and commodity prices moved higher.

The loonie rose 0.3 of a cent to 98.64 cents US.

Prices were higher across the board on commodity markets Monday morning with the June crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange ahead 37 cents to US$93.37 a barrel.

July copper in New York gained five cents to US$3.24 a pound.

Gold prices also advanced amid a weak U.S. dollar, with the June contract in New York ahead $22.20 to US$1,475.80 an ounce.

Traders also looked ahead to important economic data coming out during the week.

The merchandise trade balance for March comes out Thursday and Statistics Canada is expected to report that the trade deficit narrowed to $700 million from $1.05 billion the previous month.

And the next day, economists expect the agency to report that Canadian gross domestic product grew by 0.2 per cent in February following a similar advance in January.

Central banks will also be in focus this week.

The Federal Reserve wraps up its two-day meeting Wednesday and investors are increasingly confident that the central bank will signal it doesn’t intend to wrap up its third round of quantitative easing soon. That easing has taken the form of the Fed spending US$85 billion a month on mortgage backed securities and government Treasurys to keep long term rates low and encourage lending.

Traders will also be anxious to gauge the Fed’s assessment of the American economy over the next few months, particularly given data released last week showing U.S. economic growth coming in at an annualized rate of 2.5 per cent, softer than the three per cent rate that had been expected.

There are also high hopes that the European Central Bank will announce a rate cut on Thursday amid deteriorating economic conditions across the eurozone. Analysts think a cut of 0.25 of a point to 0.5 per cent could be in the cards, which would be the ECB’s first rate cut since mid-2012 despite a deepening recession, an offshoot of the government debt crisis that is plaguing the 17-member currency union.

The major event is at the end of the week. The U.S. government is expected to announce that the economy created about 150,000 jobs in April, with the unemployment rate holding steady at 7.6 per cent.