FEBRUARY 10 2023 Red Hot Labour Market Despite Rate Hikes Today’s Labour Force Survey (LFS) for January was much stronger than expected, once again calling into question how long the Bank of Canada’s rate pause will last. This report showed no evidence that the labour market is slowing in response to the vast and rapid […]

FEBRUARY 7 2023 The Bank of Canada’s (BoC) trend-setting policy rate is fixed until March, and the Bank’s leadership is proclaiming a “conditional pause” in the rate-hiking cycle. That has led to a growing notion that interest rate cuts are coming. Some forecasts say the Bank could pivot from raising to lowering, by the end […]

FEBRUARY 6 2023 Even bond traders and economists are stumped about what the next few years will bring. The repercussions of a global economy that stopped suddenly, shed millions of jobs and initially contracted 30% only to rebound in a flash on the back of free-money government programs are still being felt. Predicting where the […]

JANUARY 25 2023 No Surprises Here: The Bank of Canada Hiked Rates By Only 25 bps, Signalling a Pause As expected, the Bank of Canada–satisfied with the sharp decline in recent inflation pressure–raised the policy rate by only 25 bps to 4.5%. Forecasting that inflation will return to roughly 3.0% later this year and to […]

JANUARY 2023 What a year this has been. In the face of red-hot inflation, the Bank of Canada raised its policy rate by a whopping 400 basis points to 4.25%. First to cool was the housing market, where buyers moved to the sidelines and mortgage rates surged. Home prices fell, especially in Toronto and Vancouver. The […]

JANUARY 18 2023 Good News on the Inflation Front in December The Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 6.3% year over year in December, down from the 6.8% pace in November. Much of the decline was owing to the drop in gasoline prices. Additional deceleration came from homeowners’ replacement costs, fuel oil and other owned accommodation expenses, […]

JANUARY 17 2023 OSFI Is At It Again Late last week, the Office of the Superintendent for Financial Institutions (OSFI) announced it was concerned about the risks associated with the large and rising number of highly indebted borrowers, especially those with floating-rate mortgages, which stands at a record proportion of outstanding mortgage loans.  With the […]

JANUARY 16 2023 December Housing Data Ended 2022 On A Weak Note Statistics released today by the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) show national home sales were up month-over-month in December while new listings plummeted and national home prices fell again. Home sales recorded over Canadian MLS® Systems increased 1.3% between November and December 2022. […]

JANUARY 6 2023 Employment Report Ended 2022 With A Boom Today’s Labour Force Survey for December was much stronger than expected, raising the odds of a 25 bps increase in the policy rate by the Bank of Canada on January 25th. While the Bank has hiked rates by 400 bps to 4.25%, core inflation remains […]

DECEMBER 21 2022 The Bank of Canada Won’t Like This Inflation Report November’s CPI inflation rate fell only one tick to 6.8%, despite gasoline prices falling. This follows a two-month reading of 6.9%. Excluding food and energy, prices rose 5.4% yearly last month, up from 5.3% in October. Critical gauges of underlying price pressure were […]