The midsummer earnings season got off to a slow start today as markets closed lower across North America.

In Toronto, the TSE 300 shed 122 points, or 1.6%, to close at 7,644.

The declines were market wide, each of the TSE’s 14 sub-indices every finished in the red. The way down was led by a massive 8.1% drop in the metals and minerals sub-index.

Market trend among individual issues was also strongly negative with decliners outpacing advancers 649 to 379. Volume was extremely light at 98 million shares.

The drop in the metals and minerals was the result of an 11.5% decline in the price of Alcan after it announced dramatically lower second quarter results. The stock closed at $59.75.

The industrial products sub-index fell 3% on a $1.10 decline in the price of Nortel, which closed at $12.10. Celestica was also off today. It dropped 3.3% to close at $68.27.

The gold sector slipped 2.7% today, while oil, paper consumer products and real estate were off between 1% and 2%..

Another big loser today was Telus. It finished off almost 10% today at $27.25, despite an announced increase in wireless subscribers at its Telus Mobility division.

The CDNX shed 26 points to close at 3,135. Volume was low at 24.6 million shares. Overall decliners outpaced advancers 227 to 172.

The loonie, which was trading below 65¢ this morning, recovered later in the day to finish at 65.03¢ US, off 0.3% from Friday.

In New York, most of today’s selling was among tech stocks. While the Dow Jones industrial average was only off 67 points at 10,472, a drop of less than 1%, the Nasdaq composite shed 56 points to close at 2,029, a decline of 2.67%. The broader-market S&P 500 split the difference dropping 1.09% to close at 1,202.