Bank of Canada expected to raise interest rates Wednesday July 11, 2018
The Bank of Canada is expected to raise key interest rates from 1.25 percent since mid-January to 1.5 percent. In reality, this shouldn’t be a big deal, but the problem with printing and borrowing so much money is that even 0.001% could have a huge impact. In my opinion, this shouldn’t have a huge impact on the market unless the BoC is forced to continue this trend. If the BoC does this once every 6 month’s and the Trump backs down from his NAFTA trade war in the near future the impact on Canadians should be minimal.
However, if Poloz is in a situation where his hand is forced to continue raising interest rates, well the Canadian economy is in a world of trouble. Trump has been stealing the news headlines in Canada and that’s allowed debt to continue to creep up, the housing and condo prices in Toronto continue to rise even though there’s an abundance of empty condos all around the GTA today. In fact, a lot of condo developments around the GTA aren’t being finished because there aren’t enough DOMESTIC buyers. Foreign buyers typically want condos that are near Universities or Subway stations and good neighborhoods, well in the Greater Toronto Area at least there have been condos put in places that don’t have the demand for them.
To add to this are auto loans, the auto loan bubble often gets shoveled under the rug, but it’s there and it’s dependence revolves around an ever-growing economy, then there are home equity loans, which are the real problems. Mortgages in my opinion not that big a deal, I’m sure if there’s an economic crash the government will allow 100-year amortizations, but home equity loans, that’s a whole new type of beast. A home equity loan, in reality, is the bank’s way of making you pay more for your mortgage. If there’s ever a tightening of the mortgage or loan market it’s the home equity loans that will become the most problematic. 100-year amortizations can’t get you out of an equity loan which has a different interest rate.
The worst part to all of this, of course, is that most Canadians are already spending beyond their means, this is a habit, that creates the illusion of wealth in people’s minds. If you take peoples ability to get into debt away, well don’t be surprised when the unexpected starts happening. Trump is doing exactly what I thought he would do which is ignore Canada, Canada still has it’s tariff trade barriers up, of course as consumers we won’t notice much of anything, only that some of the items we used to get aren’t there anymore or some of the Canadian manufacturing jobs may turn into Government jobs.
These types of things go under the radar, during a trade war, people also don’t notice these events until long after, in fact, most people won’t even notice that Canada turned into a service sector economy, it might just happen. People might not understand why rent prices in Toronto are $2000 a month for a bachelor it just might happen gradually. It’s not until there’s a crash that people wake up if Canada if the Bank of Canada can avoid a crash the truth is that on the surface everything will be fine… until it’s not.
Interesting times ahead.