On Thursday, Moody’s announced that it was dropping Ontario’s debt rating from Aa-1 to Aa-2, which affects $202 billion in debt securities. Moody’s cites Ontario’s growing debt burden and its challenges to limit spending as the primary reasons behind this… Read more »
Federal Government Tables Bill to Tighten up Mortgage Lending
The federal government has tabled a bill Thursday to provide the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) oversight of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). The amount of lending that CMHC insures has tripled from $200 billion… Read more »
U.S. Announces National Bioeconomy Blueprint
The biotechnology sector has been eagerly awaiting the announcement of a national bioeconomy plan by the Obama administration that is expected to be released today. The White House blueprint intends to spur development of renewable resources such as crops and… Read more »
Direct Government Funding – Benefits and Detriments
SR&ED and NRC IRAP are both substantial business support programs offered by the Canadian federal government. However, one of the major differences between the 2 programs is that NRC IRAP endorses direct up-front funding, whereas SR&ED is a tax credit for expenses… Read more »
April’s Labour Force Survey
On Friday, StatsCan released the results of April’s Labour Force Survey, and after two months where we have seen very little change, employment rose by 58,000. While most of the employment was seen in part time, this has helped result… Read more »
Quarterly Operating Profits
Today, Stats Can announced that operating profits in the fourth quarter had risen up 7.9% since the last quarter, to $65.5 billion among Canadian corporations. In the non-financial sector, profits increased a total of 7.3%, to $49.6 billion. Manufacturing itself… Read more »
December’s Monthly Survey of Manufacturing
Yesterday, Stats Can posted the results of December’s Survey of Manufacturing. It turns out that in December manufacturing sales increased by 0.4% to $45.4 billion. A breakdown of industries is as follows: Primary metal: increased by 3.9% Petroleum and Coal… Read more »
Agricultural Industry Hampered by Agricutre Policy?
According to a new report published by the Canadian Agri-Food Policy Institute (CAPI), Canada is not doing as well as we have in the past when it comes to the agriculture industry. The report suggests that Canada’s agricultural policy needs… Read more »
Employement in January Rose
Today, StatsCan released January’s Labour Force Survey. They stated that: Employment rose for the second consecutive month in January, with a gain of 69,000. At the same time, the unemployment rate increased by 0.2 percentage points to 7.8%, as more… Read more »