Fiscal support, stabilising financial conditions, and a historic surge in immigration are helping the Canadian economy – and the loonie – defy bearish expectations. Continued labour market tightness, rebounding housing markets, and high levels of consumer consumption have combined to deliver remarkably-robust growth rates.

Although the Bank of Canada’s latest Business Outlook Survey showed excess demand and labour shortages coming down to pre-pandemic levels, its Consumer Expectations Survey revealed an improvement in household confidence, with many respondents expecting wages to rise, interest rates to fall, and home prices to climb over the coming year.

The central bank has responded to signs of excess demand-fuelled inflation with a second round of rate hikes, and investors are currently putting 45-percent odds on another move by the October meeting – with rate cuts seen coming later, and at a more measured cadence than in the United States. Interest rate differentials have narrowed sharply from their peaks, and – although its gains look less impressive in nominal terms – the loonie is outperforming many of its counterparts against the greenback.

Annual change in total population, %