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This paper predicts phases of the financial cycle by using a continuous financial stress measure in a Markov switching framework. The debt service ratio and property market variables signal a transition to a high financial stress regime, while economic sentiment indicators provide signals for a transition to a tranquil state.

At the onset of the pandemic, the Bank of Canada transitioned its framework for monetary policy implementation from a corridor system to a floor system, which it has since decided to maintain. We provide a comprehensive analysis of both frameworks and assess their relative merits based on five key criteria that define a sound framework.

Central banks must cope with considerable uncertainty about what will happen in the economy when formulating monetary policy. This article describes the different types of uncertainty that arise and looks at examples of uncertainty that the Bank has recently encountered. It then reviews the strategies employed by the Bank to deal with this problem. The other articles in this special issue focus on three of these major strategies.

The Great Recession and current pandemic have focused attention on the constraint on nominal interest rates from the effective lower bound.

This article discusses three scenarios for the adjustment of the global economy. In a “baseline” scenario—which encompasses fiscal consolidation in major advanced economies, growth-friendly structural reforms in Europe and Japan, and greater exchange rate flexibility and reforms in the emerging-market economies of Asia to induce rotation of demand away from net exports—global current account imbalances […]

The theory that rich economic diversity of businesses and households both affects and is shaped by economy-wide fluctuations has strong implications for monetary policy. This review places these insights in a Canadian context.

Using a nonlinear New Keynesian model with a financial accelerator, we show that financial frictions generate large state-dependent amplification effects. Shocks propagate more strongly in periods of financial stress. We propose an endogenous regime-switching DSGE framework for efficient estimation and improved model fit.

Since 2014, the Bank of Canada (BoC) has maintained a comprehensive database of sovereign defaults to systematically measure and aggregate the nominal value of the different types of sovereign government debt in default. The database is posted on the BoC’s website and is updated annually in partnership with the Bank of England (BoE).

The Chinese housing market has grown rapidly following its liberalization in the 1990s, generating significant economic activity and demand for base metals. In this paper, we discuss the evolution of the Chinese housing market and quantify its importance for the overall Chinese economy and its linkages to base metal prices.