By Chris Fournier Jan. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Canada’s dollar traded at almost the weakest level this year versus its U.S. counterpart before a government report expected to show retail sales fell in November for the first time in four months. Canada’s dollar has dropped 2.3 percent since Jan. 15 in what would be the worst weekly performance since the five days ended Oct. 30. The Bank of Canada reiterated this week its conditional pledge to leave the target lending rate at a record low 0.25 percent until the end of June. The Canadian currency fetched C$1.0538 per U.S. dollar at 8:07 a.m. in Toronto, compared with C$1.0524 yesterday. It earlier touched C$1.0546, the weakest level since Dec. 31. One Canadian dollar buys 94.93 U.S. cents. Retail sales dropped 0.2 percent in November after climbing 0.8 percent, 1.1 percent and 0.9 percent in the previous three months, according to the median forecast of 21 economists in a Bloomberg survey. The report from Statistics Canada is scheduled to be released at 8:30 a.m. Ottawa time. The yen and U.S. dollar are the two top performers this week against the Canadian currency among its 16 most-traded counterparts tracked by Bloomberg. To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Fournier in Montreal at cfournier3@bloomberg.net

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