Analysts said those two factors had helped shield the Canadian dollar from the negative impact of the economy’s worse-than-expected jobs report last Friday.
Canada‘s economy lost 207,100 jobs in April, more than analysts’ estimates of 175,000 job losses, with declines driven by coronavirus restrictions in populous Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia, data showed.
“Easy money, rising growth and supply bottlenecks are pushing speculative money out of the U.S. dollar and into the commodity complex,” said Karl Schamotta, chief market strategist at Cambridge Global Payments in Toronto. “Echoes of 2008-2009 are clear.”
The Canadian dollar has rallied against the greenback since the BoC flagged last month that it could begin hiking interest rates in late 2022 and cut the pace of its bond purchases.
Since roughly mid-April, the loonie has gained nearly 5%.
In afternoon trading, the loonie rose 0.2% to C$1.2094 per U.S. dollar, or 82.67 U.S. cents, having earlier touched its strongest intraday level since September 2017 at C$1.2080.
The Canadian currency also rose as copper raced to a record peak on Monday as investors worried about missing out on further gains. Copper slipped in afternoon trading, however, as bullish investors who recently entered the surging market became nervous about a possible correction.
Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange climbed to an all-time high of $10,747.50 a ton on Monday after breaking through a decade-old record on Friday.
“Traders are Gamestopping the Canadian dollar, bidding it in synchrony with soaring base metal prices,” said Schamotta, referring to the U.S. stock that was propelled by retail traders to record highs.
“The C$1.2000 threshold – a big and enticing round number – looms ahead, with a breakthrough looking more likely by the minute,” he said.
Canadian government bond yields were little changed across the curve, with the 10-year up slightly at 1.515% from 1.5% late on Friday.
(Reporting by Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss; Editing by Steve Orlofsky and Peter Cooney)
OTTAWA – The parliamentary budget officer says the federal government likely failed to keep its deficit below its promised $40 billion cap in the last fiscal year.
However the PBO also projects in its latest economic and fiscal outlook today that weak economic growth this year will begin to rebound in 2025.
The budget watchdog estimates in its report that the federal government posted a $46.8 billion deficit for the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland pledged a year ago to keep the deficit capped at $40 billion and in her spring budget said the deficit for 2023-24 stayed in line with that promise.
The final tally of the last year’s deficit will be confirmed when the government publishes its annual public accounts report this fall.
The PBO says economic growth will remain tepid this year but will rebound in 2025 as the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts stimulate spending and business investment.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says the level of food insecurity increased in 2022 as inflation hit peak levels.
In a report using data from the Canadian community health survey, the agency says 15.6 per cent of households experienced some level of food insecurity in 2022 after being relatively stable from 2017 to 2021.
The reading was up from 9.6 per cent in 2017 and 11.6 per cent in 2018.
Statistics Canada says the prevalence of household food insecurity was slightly lower and stable during the pandemic years as it fell to 8.5 per cent in the fall of 2020 and 9.1 per cent in 2021.
In addition to an increase in the prevalence of food insecurity in 2022, the agency says there was an increase in the severity as more households reported moderate or severe food insecurity.
It also noted an increase in the number of Canadians living in moderately or severely food insecure households was also seen in the Canadian income survey data collected in the first half of 2023.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct 16, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says manufacturing sales in August fell to their lowest level since January 2022 as sales in the primary metal and petroleum and coal product subsectors fell.
The agency says manufacturing sales fell 1.3 per cent to $69.4 billion in August, after rising 1.1 per cent in July.
The drop came as sales in the primary metal subsector dropped 6.4 per cent to $5.3 billion in August, on lower prices and lower volumes.
Sales in the petroleum and coal product subsector fell 3.7 per cent to $7.8 billion in August on lower prices.
Meanwhile, sales of aerospace products and parts rose 7.3 per cent to $2.7 billion in August and wood product sales increased 3.8 per cent to $3.1 billion.
Overall manufacturing sales in constant dollars fell 0.8 per cent in August.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 16, 2024.
