USD/CAD clings to daily gains above 1.3250 as WTI stays in red

• WTI fails to build on Wednesday's recovery.
• US Dollar Index advances to two-week highs on Thursday.
• Coming up: Speeches by Fed's Clarida and Kaplan.

After recording gains for the fourth straight day on Wednesday, the USD/CAD pair extended its rally on the back of the broad-based USD strength and touched its highest level since January 30 at 1.3283. Although the pair erased a small portion of its recent gains in the last hours, it still trades in the positive territory, adding 0.46% on the day at 1.3265.

The greenback continued to take advantage of the heavy selling pressure surrounding major European currencies today and the US Dollar Index rose to its highest level in two weeks at 96.67. With the GBP/USD pair staging a rebound following BoE Governor Carney's comments, the index retreated from its daily highs and was last seen at 96.50, where it was adding 0.12% on the day. The only data from the U.S. today showed that the initial jobless claims fell to 234K in the week ending February 1 to miss the market expectation of 221K.

On the other hand, crude oil prices, which settled in the positive territory yesterday after the EIA report showed a less-than-expected increase in the crude oil inventories in the U.S., came under a renewed pressure amid the dominating risk-off mood and weighed on the commodity-sensitive loonie. At the moment, the barrel of WTI is losing 0.7% on the day at $53.50.

Later in the day, markets will be paying close attention to Fed's Clarida's and Dallas Fed President Kaplan's speeches. The next significant data from Canada, January employment report, will be released on Friday.

Key technical levels