Loonie, dollar trade at par

NEW YORK — For the first time since Gerald Ford was president, the loonie can buy as much as the greenback.

The U.S. dollar’s recent decline against the Canadian dollar, the euro, and even the Indian rupee, means Americans will pay more for imports and trips to Paris, Rome, Bangalore and Toronto. It also may drive overseas demand for U.S. goods and help raise profits at U.S. multinational corporations.

The U.S. dollar reached 1-to-1 parity against the Canadian dollar Thursday for the first time since November 1976. That means one Canadian dollar now buys one U.S. dollar, so a bottle of maple syrup could cost an American as much in Toronto as it does in New York.

Today’s numbers, however, do not mean that the dollar is facing a meltdown.

Thursday’s drop is of greater concern to currency markets than U.S. households, except “if you’re a connoisseur of French wines or Canadian maple syrup,” said David Gilmore, a partner at Foreign Exchange Analytics in Essex, Conn.

A lower dollar makes U.S. exports more competitive, which is good news for American manufacturers but spells rising prices for imports to the U.S. The dollar’s decline also diminished the spending power of American tourists while attracting to the U.S. foreign visitors who seek cheaper accommodations and shopping.

Daina Jefferies exited Macy’s at the Walden Galleria Mall in the Buffalo suburb of Cheektowaga, about 10 miles from the Canadian border, and added a couple of bags to a collection already in the back of her car.

“I just bought the same things I bought last week in Toronto for half the price,” she said. “I’m going to go home and return them. I knew I was coming so I thought I wouldn’t take the tags off. Now there’s no way I’m keeping it because it’s twice as expensive.”

Krys Esteves of Caledon, near Toronto, headed into the mall with her mother, Maria Swica of Mississauga, Ontario, planning to take advantage of weaker American dollar.

“My son wants a soft-serve ice cream maker for Christmas so I’m looking for that,” Esteves said. “It’s just to compare. Right now, I know it’s definitely to our advantage.”

The Canadian dollar hovered near parity in late New York trading Thursday, buying 99.93 U.S. cents.

Known as the loonie because of the bird pictured on the one-dollar coin, Canada’s currency rose sharply against the U.S. dollar after the Federal Reserve on Tuesday announced a dramatic half-point cut in its benchmark interest rates. While it shored up U.S. credit markets, the cut further weakened the dollar against other currencies by reducing returns on dollar-denominated investments.