The Bank of Canada held its key lending interest rate at 5% for the fourth consecutive meeting. Of particular note, the central bank said, for the first time, that it won’t raise interest rates again if the economy moves in line with forecasts. “If the economy evolves broadly in line with the projection we published […]
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Statistics Canada announced that the country’s inflation rate in December ticked up to 3.4%, which is up from 3.1% in November. The increase was fueled due to gas prices and higher prices at grocery stores. Grocery prices held pat at 4.7% while prices at restaurants have risen by 5.6% over the last year. Housing prices […]
The December Consumer Price Index, or CPI, which measures U.S. inflation, rose 0.3% month over month. to 3.4%. This is up from a November reading of 3.1% and higher than the 0.2% month-over-month increase and 3.2% annual reading economist’s were expecting. Housing costs were responsible for more than half of the increase in prices followed […]
A lot can change in a year. In January 2023, Canada’s inflation rate stood at 5.9%, the Bank of Canada increased its overnight lending rate to 4.25%, and the TSX closed out 2022 down 1.25%. Fast forward to January 2024, and the inflation rate is down, but still too high at 3.1%, the overnight lending […]
Statistics Canada announced that Canada’s inflation rate slowed to 3.1% in October, that’s down significantly from the 3.8% reading in September. There is a caveat to that drop in inflation, however. The big deceleration was mainly a result of lower gas prices, which were down 6.4% over September and down 7.8% from where gas prices […]
This year was supposed to be a mixed one for stocks, with rising interest rates, stubbornly high inflation, and lower commodity prices expected to be headwinds for Canadian and U.S. stocks. But it hasn’t turned out that way. In spite of economic uncertainty, the S&P 500 is up 17.5% year-to-date, the NASDAQ has rallied an […]
The Canadian dollar has reversed the gains it made against the U.S. dollar in the first half of the year. The Canadian dollar performed well in the opening quarters of 2023, climbing 3.6% against the U.S. dollar. The loonie was actually the best performing major G-10 currency in June after rising 2.4%. That momentum carried […]
Halloween may be over but that doesn’t mean it isn’t still scary on Bay Street and Wall Street. On July 27 the S&P 500 hit a 52-week high of 4,240, putting it up 19.5% year-to-date. The big moves defied logic, with inflation stubbornly high and interest rates still on the rise. But then stocks started […]
Canada’s inflation rate unexpectedly dipped in September to 3.8%. That’s down from 4.0% in August. The 3.8% figure is below the 4.0% figure economists were expecting inflation to come in at. The cooling of Canada’s inflation was pretty broad based too, with prices falling for some travel-related services, durable goods, and groceries. The latter of […]
Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem said that the central bank’s aggressive interest rate policy is working at bringing down inflation. After raising its key lending rate 10 times since the start of 2022, from 0.25% to 5.0%, Canada’s inflation rate has retraced from a 39-year high of 8.1% in June 2022 to 4.0% today. […]
