Canada Chart Book Mixed signals from underlying inflation The January CPI data provided mixed signals about developments in underlying inflation. The CPI excluding food and energy and the CPI excluding the eight most volatile components each rose by just 0.1... 22nd February 2023 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Surveys point to much slower employment growth The sharp fall in hiring intentions in the Bank of Canada’s Business Outlook Survey suggests that the 104,000 surge in employment in December is not a sign of things to come. The survey points to a... 23rd January 2023 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Core inflation pressures still too strong for comfort The renewed rise in the three-month annualised rates of CPI-trim and CPI-median inflation in November call into question the idea that the Bank of Canada has already finished its tightening cycle... 21st December 2022 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Construction the next shoe to drop The big surprise so far this year has been the resilience of housing starts which, despite falling from their 10-month high of 300,000 annualised in September, remained at a relatively strong 267,000... 24th November 2022 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Canadian oil prices underperforming The rebound in global oil prices over the past month has not been matched by those in Canada, with Western Canadian Select (WCS) instead trading closer to $60 per barrel, as the discount between WCS... 25th October 2022 · 9 mins read
Canada Chart Book Underlying inflation pressures easing The fall in headline inflation to 7.0% in August, from 7.6%, was largely due to energy price effects, but there were also some encouraging signs that underlying inflationary pressures are easing. The... 28th September 2022 · 9 mins read
Canada Chart Book Rental boom keeps construction elevated The surge in interest rates so far this year has contributed to a sharp decline in home sales but, so far at least, that has not weighed on construction activity. Housing starts averaged 279,000... 24th August 2022 · 9 mins read
Canada Chart Book Weaker new home sales to drag down construction The extent of the downturn in the housing market and broader residential investment will determine whether the economy enters a recession in the next 12 months, and in that respect there has been some... 26th July 2022 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Tight labour market pushing up wages The tight labour market is putting upward pressure on wages, with the Labour Force Survey showing a strong 1.0% m/m rise in average hourly earnings in May. While the annual rate of wage growth, at 3.9... 29th June 2022 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Core inflation still rising With core CPI inflation still rising, the Bank of Canada has no choice but to continue hiking its policy rate “forcefully’ back toward neutral. All three of the core measures tracked by the Bank are... 26th May 2022 · 9 mins read
Canada Chart Book Productivity rebound to offset stronger wage growth The further fall in the unemployment rate in March, to a multi-decade low of 5.3%, raises the risk that a sharp acceleration in wage growth will exacerbate inflationary pressures, at a time when... 27th April 2022 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Market-implied policy tightening could topple housing The surge in interest rate expectations is a key risk to housing. We recently set out how, due to the much larger share of variable rate mortgages than before the pandemic, the Bank of Canada would... 23rd March 2022 · 9 mins read
Canada Chart Book Inflationary pressures broadening The evidence of broadening inflationary pressures and the further rise in oil prices suggest that the balance of risks to our inflation forecast lies to the upside. The January consumer price data... 23rd February 2022 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Wage growth could prompt faster policy tightening The Bank of Canada’s fourth-quarter Business Outlook Survey showed firms’ wage expectations at a record high, which suggests that wage growth could accelerate to far above the pre-pandemic norm this... 25th January 2022 · 9 mins read
Canada Chart Book Restrictions to weigh on first-quarter GDP growth The economy gained momentum at the start of the fourth quarter and we have revised up our forecast for fourth-quarter GDP growth to 5.5% annualised, from 4.0%. Given the rapidly deteriorating... 23rd December 2021 · 8 mins read
Canada Chart Book Wage growth picking up The sharp slowdown in the pace of hiring in the October Labour Force Survey caught the headlines, but the more important development was the sharp rise in fixed-weight average hourly earnings. Based... 23rd November 2021 · 9 mins read
