January 11, 2021 Canadian Survey of Consumer Expectations—Fourth Quarter of 2020 The Canadian Survey of Consumer Expectations (CSCE) collects respondents’ views on inflation, the labour market and household finances. The survey for the fourth quarter of 2020 was conducted from November 10 to December 1, 2020. This period coincides with a sharp increase in COVID‑19 cases across Canada and follows announcements about the development of effective vaccines. Since the survey was conducted, some provinces have imposed additional measures to contain the spread of the virus. In addition, the first vaccines have begun to be administered. Like the previous two surveys, the fourth-quarter survey included questions on the impacts of COVID‑19 and the measures to contain its spread. This survey also asked respondents how they used any benefits they received from income-support programs that governments put in place to help them through the pandemic. This quarter, the report provides some details by demographic characteristics. Content Type(s): Publications, Canadian Survey of Consumer Expectations
November 27, 2020 Financial Markets’ Response to COVID-19 Policy Interventions Policy-makers reacted to the COVID-19 crisis through a variety of channels. This Systemic Risk Centre conference, co-organized with the Bank of Canada, focused on how financial markets responded to these policy initiatives and asked what we have learned for future interventions. Content Type(s): Conferences and workshops
Why Fixed Costs Matter for Proof-of-Work Based Cryptocurrencies Staff Working Paper 2020-27 Rodney J. Garratt, Maarten van Oordt Can Bitcoin survive? Some say it will become vulnerable to attacks as the rewards for processing Bitcoin transactions continue to decline. The economics of fixed costs suggest the specialized hardware used to mine Bitcoin may be key to its survival. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Digital currencies and fintech, Payment clearing and settlement systems JEL Code(s): G, G1, G10, L, L1, L11
The potential effect of a central bank digital currency on deposit funding in Canada Staff Analytical Note 2020-15 Alejandro García, Bena Lands, Xuezhi Liu, Joshua Slive A retail central bank digital currency denominated in Canadian dollars could, in theory, create competition for bank deposit funding. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes Topic(s): Digital currencies and fintech, Financial institutions, Financial stability JEL Code(s): E, E4, E41, E44, E5, G, G1, G10, G17, G2, G21, G3, G32, O
June 16, 2020 Opening Statement before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance Opening statement Tiff Macklem House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance Ottawa, Ontario Introduction Good afternoon, Chair and committee members. It is an honour for me to appear before you as the 10th Governor of the Bank of Canada. I look forward to working with parliamentarians over the next seven years through regular appearances before committees of the House and Senate. These are an important part of the […] Content Type(s): Press, Speeches and appearances, Opening statements Topic(s): Bank notes, Coronavirus disease (COVID-19), Financial stability, Monetary policy, Recent economic and financial developments
June 15, 2020 Operational details for upcoming secondary market purchases of Government of Canada securities (June 22-July 3) As previously announced, the Bank of Canada (the Bank) launched on April 1, 2020 a program to purchase Government of Canada securities in the secondary market – the Government Bond Purchase Program (GBPP). Content Type(s): Press, Market notices Source(s): Government of Canada Bond Purchase Program
An Economic Perspective on Payments Migration Staff Working Paper 2020-24 Anneke Kosse, Zhentong Lu, Gabriel Xerri Consumers, businesses and banks make millions of payments each day using a variety of instruments, such as debit cards, cheques and wires. Canada is currently developing three new systems to process these transactions: Lynx, Settlement Optimization Engine (SOE) and Real-Time Rail (RTR). Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial services, Financial system regulation and policies, Payment clearing and settlement systems JEL Code(s): E, E4, E42, G, G2, G21
June 10, 2020 Our COVID-19 response: Keeping markets liquid Toni Gravelle When the COVID-19 pandemic hit Canada, the Bank of Canada acted quickly. We needed to make sure the financial system worked well enough that credit could continue to flow. That meant addressing shortages of liquidity in financial markets—the backbone for lending and borrowing in the economy. Content Type(s): Publications, The Economy, Plain and Simple Topic(s): Coronavirus disease (COVID-19)
Trading on Long-term Information Staff Working Paper 2020-20 Corey Garriott, Ryan Riordan Investors who trade based on good research are said to be the backbone of stock markets: They conduct research to discover the value of stocks and, through their trading, guide financial prices to reflect true value. What can make their job difficult is that high-speed, short-term traders could use machine learning and other technologies to infer when informed investors are trading. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial institutions, Financial markets, Market structure and pricing JEL Code(s): G, G1, G14, G2, G20, L, L1
The Term Structures of Loss and Gain Uncertainty Staff Working Paper 2020-19 Bruno Feunou, Ricardo Lopez Aliouchkin, Roméo Tedongap, Lai Xu We investigate the uncertainty around stock returns at different investment horizons. Since a return is either a loss or a gain, we categorize return uncertainty into two components—loss uncertainty and gain uncertainty. We then use these components to evaluate investment. Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Asset pricing, Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): G, G1, G12