North American markets bounced back to start the week, with Toronto’s benchmark TSX Composite rising more than two-and-a-half per cent after Friday’s sell-off. The three benchmark U.S. indices posted even larger gains, with the S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq all rising more than three per cent.

The commodity complex was largely under pressure, with ongoing concerns over global growth in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact of the oil price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia hammering crude. Benchmark West Texas Intermediate fell more than six percent to its lowest level in nearly two decades, while Alberta’s Western Canadian Select hit a new record low of less than four dollars per barrel.

In Toronto, the TSX was led higher by the financials, energy, and industrials subgroups. Energy was the second-largest contributor on a points basis to the composite’s gains, in a move that ran counter to the declines in underlying commodity prices. Suncor Energy Inc. and Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. are two of the dominant members of the index, an aspect a pair of energy investors said should give market watchers pause when it comes to reading too much into the rally.

“Canadian best in class, large liquid names caught a bid and now dragging others up,” Rafi Tahmazian, senior portfolio manager at Canoe Financial, said in an email to BNN Bloomberg. “But the results are twisted because two companies represent over 50 [per cent] of the index and they are the 'large liquid flight to quality' names that everybody gravitates to. CNQ and Suncor are up 14 and 17 per cent which makes it look like the whole sector is up.”

Ninepoint Partners senior portfolio manager and partner Eric Nuttall took a similar view, telling BNN Bloomberg he expects further divergence between energy companies and oil as markets become more distorted.

“Energy stocks are wickedly oversold so we’re due for a bounce,” he said in an email to BNN Bloomberg. “I’ve been expecting them to start to diverge from short-term dynamics as price drops further with ballooning inventories.”

Canadian Natural and Suncor capped off the day as two of the three largest percentage movers in the index, along with MEG Energy, whose shares are typically highly volatile to any shift in energy industry trading. On the flip side, cannabis stocks were smacked, with Hexo Corp. posting the largest loss on the composite, followed by Aurora Cannabis Inc.

Among the other sharp declines, shares of Cineplex Inc. plunged deeper into the red after JPMorgan analyst Alexander Mees cast serious doubt on the timeline for the company to sell itself to U.K.-based Cineworld Group plc. In a note to clients, Mees said he “cannot envisage a realistic scenario” where the deal could be completed in the first half of this year as the theatre industry grapples with shutdowns due to the virus outbreak. Cineplex reached a deal to sell itself to Cineworld last year for $34 per share.

Other losers included Cominar Real Estate Investment Trust, whose units suffered after the company pulled its financial forecast for fiscal 2020 late Friday in the face of the virus. The company, which has office, industrial and retail exposure, said mandated shutdowns of non-essential businesses could hurt its retail unit. It also shelved any planned asset sales in the face of real estate market uncertainty.

Inter Pipeline Ltd. shares also fell after the company slashed its dividend 72 per cent, citing the one-two punch of the virus outbreak and the oil price war. The company concurrently cut executive pay and put its plans to sell its European bulk storage business on ice in the face of the uncertainty.