Here you will find Candian Articles relating the Market Insights Community.
Falling leaves and declining temperatures turn our thoughts to the thermostat and what is going to happen to heating costs this winter.
Well, first the good news. For the over 50% of households in Canada that heat with natural gas the cost of heating this winter should decline. This outlook is based on several key factors.
It’s been a bit of a shock to see the glowing employment numbers released by Statistics Canada today. The increase in number of jobs in the country at +31,000 is considerably above most analysts’ estimates. In fact, it is higher than the long-term monthly rate of job creation in Canada going back nearly 20 years. Furthermore, there was a 92,000-job-gain in full-time employment, which was partly offset by a 61,000 decline in part-time employment. But full-time jobs are generally valued more highly, since they are higher-paying and more stable in most instances.
The accompanying table records the 10 largest construction project starts in Canada in September 2009. Also included is the latest trend graph on starts. This looks at 12-month moving totals of the two major non-residential building categories in Canada − total ICI starts and engineering work. ICI stands for industrial, commercial and institutional.
Although construction prices are still well below year-ago levels, there are signs that the recent uptrend in housing demand, and in domestic demand generally, is causing prices to start to firm.
This view is based on the fact that while the CanaData Construction Price Index in August was down by 6.5% compared to its year ago level, over the past three months it’s only dipped by 1.3%.
This story includes two graphs that show in dramatic fashion the ways that the U.S. and Canadian economies have taken different paths through this latest recession. The American experience has been much worse than the Canadian one because of a weaker residential construction market leading to a steeper slide in consumer spending. Consumption plays a big role in economic growth.
Canada’s population grew by a surprisingly strong 0.36% in the second quarter of 2009. This was slightly less than the 0.38% recorded in Q2/2008, which was a 17-year high.
According to Statistics Canada, 70% of the second quarter population increase was due to net international migration, while natural increase (births minus deaths) accounted for the remaining 30%.
This is an interesting day in the life of an economist. It was almost exactly a year ago that North American stock markets plunged in depression-like fashion. Today is also when the Bureau of Economic Analysis released its revised estimate of second-quarter U.S. GDP growth, or more accurately, change. Q2 has been revised from -1.0% to -0.7% (quarter to quarter annualized).
There have been three key dates for Canada over the past 15 months. The first was in July 2008, when world commodity prices peaked. The second was Sept. 30 when stock markets collapsed. That was when the recession really began for Canada. The third was in February of this year when international raw material prices bottomed out. The impacts of those three dates appear most clearly in two areas: real gross domestic product (GDP) and the value of the Canadian dollar.
Following back-to-back healthy increases in May and June, retail sales stalled in July, falling by 0.6%.
This unexpected pull-back in consumer spending raises concerns about the overall health of the consumer. It suggests that following a brief spurt, consumers may be tapped out and unable or unwilling to put another purchase on their credit cards.
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