American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer denied bail after being charged with killing Canadian couple
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
The Bank of Canada is warning inflation will stay higher for longer than it previously forecast and signalled that an interest rate hike may be coming sooner than expected.
The central bank said Wednesday it now forecasts that annual inflation rates will continue their upward swing through the rest of year, averaging 4.75 per cent, and be 3.4 per cent next year, up from its previous forecast of 2.4 per cent, before coming back to its two per cent target by 2023.
Driving the rise in prices are global forces that have snarled supply chains, pushed up costs for companies and limited the supply of in-demand goods. The bank expects the worst of supply problems will hit at the end of the year.
Adding to pressures are higher prices for gasoline and natural gas, and a rebound in prices for some in-person services like hotels and flight fares.
Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem said higher prices are challenging for Canadians, making it harder for them to cover their bills, but price gains should ease as temporary issues work themselves out.
And if not, he said the bank can and will act to keep inflation under control and bring it back to the central bank's comfort zone.
"We understand what our job is. Our job is to make sure that the price increases we've seen in many globally traded goods don't feed through and translate into ongoing inflation and we're going to do our job," he told reporters at a late-morning press conference.
"If there are new developments, we start to see that feed through, we will accelerate our actions to bring inflation back to target."
The bank said the economy has rebounded far enough for it to end its government bond-purchasing program aimed at encouraging lower interest rates, but the recovery is far from complete, which why it kept its key policy rate on hold at 0.25 per cent.
The bond purchases will be rolled back to the point where the bank effectively stops adding stimulus to the economy and rather maintain what is already there.
Macklem said it is "reasonable to expect" the new phase of QE will last at least until the bank raises its policy rate, which could be coming sooner than previously expected.
In its outlook Wednesday, the bank suggests interest rate increases could start as early as the second quarter of 2022, "although the very unusual challenges of reopening an economy make this timing more uncertain than usual."
TD Bank senior economist Sri Thanabalasingam expects the Bank of Canada will raise rates three times next year, taking its key rate to one per cent by the end of 2022 as the economy improves.
"That being said, we must acknowledge that there is significant uncertainty around the economic outlook right now," Thanabalasingam wrote in a note. "A resurgence of the pandemic could result in greater stimulus, but if there is a faster-than-expected acceleration in household spending, the Bank could raise rates at a faster clip."
In its monetary policy report, the Bank of Canada cut its expectations for growth in the Canadian economy this year to 5.1 per cent from its previous forecast of 6.0 per cent. Growth next year is now expected to clock in at 4.3 per cent, down from an earlier forecast for 4.6 per cent.
The central bank warned that economic growth could slow if there is a resurgence of COVID-19 cases, with the bank pointing to evidence that vaccine immunity may wane quicker than previously anticipated.
On the flip side, households may decide to start spending more of their savings sooner if they feel more comfortable on the back of high vaccination rates, which would raise demand and add to inflationary pressures.
Similarly, the outlook warns that temporary factors driving inflation could become even more persistent and drive wage growth that itself fuels an inflationary spiral.
Although the country has recovered the three million jobs lost during the depths of the COVID-19 downturn last year, unemployment remains above pre-pandemic levels among a range of indicators that Macklem said still need to improve.
At the same time, some employers are having a tough time hiring workers, which the bank said could persist as more out-of-work Canadians look to re-skill and leave industries like restaurants and bars that are in need of workers.
So far, wage growth remains at or below pre-pandemic levels, but Macklem said the bank is watching whether that changes as businesses try to attract talent and becomes a driver of inflation.
Speaking in the afternoon to the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said the federal government was acutely aware of affordability concerns, and pointed to efforts to reduce costs for daycare and housing as the government's way of addressing cost-of-living challenges.
She said that in talks with her international counterparts, Canada is not alone in seeing elevated inflation because of the complicated nature of turning on a global economy after it was largely shutdown to slow the spread of COVID-19.
"We are seeing second and third-order consequences that were impossible, I think, to anticipate because the world had never done this before," Freeland said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 27, 2021
American millionaire Jonathan Lehrer, one of two men charged in the killings of a Canadian couple in Dominica, has been denied bail.
Cabinet minister Dominic LeBlanc says he plans to run in the next election as a candidate under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's leadership, amid questions about his rumoured interest in succeeding his longtime friend for the top job.
A male columnist has apologized for a cringeworthy moment during former University of Iowa superstar and college basketball’s highest scorer Caitlin Clark’s first news conference as an Indiana Fever player.
The United States has vetoed a widely backed UN resolution that would have paved the way for full United Nations membership for the state of Palestine.
A group of suspects that allegedly defrauded seniors across Ontario and other parts of Canada using a so-called emergency grandparent scam appear to have ties to 'Italian traditional organized crime,' according to an investigator involved in the OPP-led probe.
Health Canada will change its longstanding policy restricting gay and bisexual men from donating to sperm banks in Canada, CTV News has learned. The federal health agency has adopted a revised directive removing the ban on gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men, effective May 8.
Prince Harry, the son of King Charles III and fifth in line to the British throne, has formally confirmed he is now a U.S. resident.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Technology from the 19th century has been brought out of retirement at a Newfoundland gardening store, as staff look for all the help they can get to fill orders during a busy season.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Molly Knight, a grade four student in Nova Scotia, noticed her school library did not have many books on female athletes, so she started her own book drive in hopes of changing that.
Almost 7,000 bars of pure gold were stolen from Pearson International Airport exactly one year ago during an elaborate heist, but so far only a tiny fraction of that stolen loot has been found.
When Les Robertson was walking home from the gym in North Vancouver's Lower Lonsdale neighbourhood three weeks ago, he did a double take. Standing near a burrow it had dug in a vacant lot near East 1st Street and St. Georges Avenue was a yellow-bellied marmot.
A moulting seal who was relocated after drawing daily crowds of onlookers in Greater Victoria has made a surprise return, after what officials described as an 'astonishing' six-day journey.
Just steps from Parliament Hill is a barber shop that for the last 100 years has catered to everyone from prime ministers to tourists.
A high score on a Foo Fighters pinball machine has Edmonton player Dave Formenti on a high.
A compound used to treat sour gas that's been linked to fertility issues in cattle has been found throughout groundwater in the Prairies, according to a new study.
While many people choose to keep their medical appointments private, four longtime friends decided to undergo vasectomies as a group in B.C.'s Lower Mainland.