Bank of Canada
Bank of Canada Ends Bond Purchase Stimulus and Signals Slightly Earlier Interest Rate Lift-Off Timing
October 27, 2021
Canada’s policy interest rate has been at 0.25% since a trio of 50-basis point reductions in March 2020. While significant progress has been achieved toward economic and labor market recovery, that task has not yet been sufficiently completed. Various areas of the labor market are not yet all the way back to pre-pandemic conditions. Canada’s […] More
Dollar Firms Modestly Against Backdrop of Concern over Outlook for Equities
September 8, 2021
It’s normal at any time to encounter predictions of an imminent drop in equities, and the prevalence of Casandrian warnings has increased lately. The Covid pandemic keeps chugging along and preventing a full return of economic activity to the promised land and monetary policies to a semblance of normalcy. In the United States, new cases […] More
Further Scale-Back of Canadian Bond Buying by Bank of Canada
July 14, 2021
The central bank’s Governing Council kept the overnight rate target at 0.25% and indicated in its statement that such is unlikely to be raised until sometime in the second half of 2022. But the weekly pace of government bond purchases was reduced by a billion Canadian dollars to C$ 2 billion. Such had been cut […] More
G7 Meetings, ECB Press Conference, and Released CPI and Industrial Production Share Spotlight
June 10, 2021
Climate change and challenges from China and Russia headline the agenda of this year’s Group of Seven summit in Cornwall, U.K.. This is U.S. President Biden’s first summit. The Governing Council of the European Central Bank, as expected, did not modify its accommodative monetary stance nor forward guidance regarding future policy. Key interest rates (a […] More
Bank of Canada Reduces Pace of Bond Purchases and Adjusts Forward Guidance Slightly
April 21, 2021
As expected, Canada’s overnight interest rate target, which has been 0.25% since a trio of half-percentage point cuts in March 2020, was left unchanged. However, the targeted weekly amount of quantitative stimulus was lowered from “at least 4 billion” to $3 billion, according to a released statement. Governing Council members assert a continuing need for […] More
Bank of Canada Reaffirms Existing Monetary Policy Settings
March 10, 2021
When the pandemic struck a year ago, the Bank of Canada’s Governing Council compressed the reduction of its overnight policy rate into a trio of 50-basis point cuts all in March to the record low of 0.25%, which it considers an “effective lower bound.” Additional stimulus has been provided by a program of asset purchases. […] More
Bank of Canada Policy Review
January 21, 2021
The Bank of Canada‘s overnight target rate was left at 0.25%. This effective lower boundary has been the rate level since a trio of 50-basis point cuts in March 2020. The rate will not be lifted before economic slack — estimated to be between 2.75% and 3.75% of GDP according to a released policy statement […] More
Slew of U.S. Executive Orders and Central Bank Policy Reviews
January 21, 2021
President Biden’s inaugural address yesterday called for national unity to face down the many severe challenges now juxtaposed. 17 executive orders followed to reverse several polices of the Trump era. Contrary to warnings, inauguration day was free of domestic violence. U.S. stocks experienced their greatest advance on a presidential inauguration day since 1985, when Reagan […] More
Bank of Canada’s Overnight Rate Left 0.25%
December 9, 2020
Since a trio of 50-basis point reductions of the overnight central bank rate target last March to 0.25%, monetary policymakers have used other tools to promote growth, lift inflation, keep Canadian interest rates low across the whole yield curve. Forward guidance commits to continuing asset purchases at a pace of at least C$4 billion per […] More
Bank of Canada Left Overnight Interest Rate Target at 0.25%
October 28, 2020
Three 50-basis point interest rate cuts to an effective floor of 0.25% were implemented by Canadian central bank officials during March, and they continue to affirm that the rate will not be raised until “economic slack is absorbed so that the 2% inflation target is sustainably achieved.” Current projections do not anticipate that happening until […] More
