Posts from the ‘Monday Morning Mortgage Rate Updates’ Category

We received the latest Canadian and U.S. employment data last week. The Canadian economy added only 3,200 new jobs last month, which was below the 10,000 new jobs that the consensus had been expecting. While the latest headline number disappointed, the long-term trends for our job growth are still robust (we have averaged 22,000 new jobs over the past twelve months).

We have now entered a period of rising uncertainty and at times like this, money flows into safe-haven assets like Government of Canada (GoC) bonds as the return of one’s capital becomes a more pressing concern than the return on one’s capital. That rise in demand should help keep GoC bond yields, and the fixed-mortgage rates they are priced on, at today’s ultra-low levels. Today's post explains.

The recent surge in Canadian GDP growth has fueled speculation that the Bank of Canada may begin to raise interest rates sooner than expected. Today’s post takes a detailed look at the Bank’s most recent assessment of our economy's health and offers my take on the implications for both our fixed and variable mortgage rates.

Last week we received the latest Canadian and U.S. employment reports and the data continue to confound market watchers. The unemployment rates in both countries are at levels that should be pushing average incomes higher as the demand for labour outstrips its supply, but that isn’t happening. Instead, low unemployment levels in both countries have corresponded with wage increases that are hovering close to the overall level of price inflation. Today's post offers some insight into the cause of this conundrum.

The question now being asked by anyone keeping an eye on Canadian mortgage rates is: If our economic momentum is accelerating and our output gap closes more quickly than forecast, will our mortgage rates rise more quickly than expected? Today's post offers my take.

Last week was a relatively quiet one for the factors that affect Canadian mortgage rates. Our federal budget was dubbed a “non-budget” because its content was more benign than many had feared, with our capital-gains and principal-residence tax exemptions left intact, at least for now.

Last week the U.S. Federal Reserve raised its policy rate by 0.25%, as expected. In today’s post, we’ll take a look at the highlights from the Fed’s latest statement (in italics) with my comments added, and then discuss the implications for both Canadian fixed and variable mortgage rates.