USD/CAD steadies around 1.2700, looks to close little changed

• USD/CAD struggles to make a decisive move in either direction on Thursday.
• US Dollar Index remains on track to close in the red.
• WTI is down around 1% on the day despite large draw in US crude oil stocks.

The USD/CAD dropped to a daily low of 1.2660 during the early trading hours of the American session but didn't have a hard time staging a rebound with falling crude oil prices hurting the commodity-sensitive loonie. As of writing, the pair was virtually unchanged on a daily basis at 1.2703.

Falling oil prices and weak data weigh on CAD

Earlier in the day, the selling pressure surrounding the greenback forced USD/CAD to remain in the negative territory. After rising above 91.00 on Wednesday, the US Dollar Index fell to a daily low of 90.55 on Thursday. Although the poor performance of Wall Street's main indexes helped the greenback find some demand, it remains on track to close in the negative territory and was last seen losing 0.32% at 90.65.

On the other hand, falling crude oil prices don't allow USD/CAD to capitalize on USD weakness. The barrel of West Texas Intermediate is currently losing 1.5% on the day at $60.80. The data published by the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) showed on Thursday crude oil stocks in the US declined by 7.2 million barrels last week but this report failed to provide a boost to WTI.

Additionally, the ADP Employment Change in Canada came in at -231,200 in January and missed the market expectation of -14,100 by a wide margin to keep the CAD's potential gains limited. 

Meanwhile, the US Department of Labor reported that the weekly Initial Jobless Claims rose to 861,000 and came in worse than the market expectation of 765,000. Nevertheless, the market reaction to this data was largely muted.

Technical levels to watch for