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In this issue, Bank researchers discuss inflation dynamics and global trade following the 2007–09 financial crisis. Other articles explore changes to the governance and regulation of the Canadian payments system and outline the banking services provided by the Bank of Canada. Finally, the results of the 2013 Methods-of-Payment Survey are presented.

Should a CBDC be more like cash or bank deposits? An interest-bearing, cash-like CBDC not only makes payments more efficient but also increases total demand. This has positive effects on other transactions, inducing more deposit taking and lending and, thus, bank intermediation.

For five years, the research program here at Schulich has helped to support and nurture a Canadian academic community focused on financial services. In doing so, the program has encouraged researchers to fill the gaps in our knowledge and help policy-makers and regulators to do a better job. After five years, it's useful to think back and recall the motivations for establishing this program in the first place.

The Bank of Canada maintains regular contact with financial institutions as part of the information-gathering process that feeds into the larger set of information used to arrive at its monetary policy decision. Since 1999, the Bank has been conducting a quarterly survey of the business-lending practices of major Canadian financial institutions. Analysis of the information collected shows that it is correlated with future growth in both credit and business investment. This article focuses on how the survey is conducted and describes the construction of the summary statistics, highlighting the key statistical relationships in the historical survey data.

In an economy where production takes place in multiple stages and is subject to financial frictions, how firms finance intermediate inputs matters for aggregate outcomes. This paper focuses on trade credit—the lending and borrowing of input goods between firms—and quantifies its aggregate impacts during the Great Recession.

Using an economic model as well as survey data from the Bank of Canada, we study what factors influence the adoption of Bitcoin in Canada.

This note presents the annual update of Bank of Canada staff estimates for growth in global potential output. These estimates served as key inputs to the analysis supporting the April 2025 Monetary Policy Report.

This paper contributes to the debate on the magnitude of exchange rate elasticities by providing a set of price and quantity elasticities for 51 advanced and emerging-market economies. Specifically, for each of these countries we report the elasticity of trade prices and trade quantities on both the export and on the import sides, as well as the reaction of the trade balance.

We conduct surveys to study how consumer spending responds to higher inflation expectations. Most respondents spend the same, sticking to fixed budget plans or not considering inflation for spending decisions. About 20% decrease spending because they feel poorer and cut spending to invest in inflation-proof assets. Very few increase spending.

We estimate a model of households in Norway with bequest motives, health-dependent utility, and uncertain longevity and health. Our estimates imply strong bequest motives for households both with and without offspring. We interpret this as suggestive evidence that utility from residual wealth represents forces beyond an altruistic bequest motive.