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Results from the Business Outlook Survey and the Business Leaders’ Pulse reveal that firms’ outlooks and intentions remain subdued despite a gradual improvement in sentiment. Expectations for growth in domestic and export sales are still soft. Most firms do not plan to increase staffing, and investment intentions are restrained. While businesses continue to expect cost increases from tariffs and trade uncertainty, weak demand limits their ability to pass these costs through to prices. One-year-ahead inflation expectations remain below the peak reached earlier in the trade conflict.

Results of the third-quarter 2025 survey show that tariffs and trade tensions continue to affect consumers' perceptions about their financial health and spending plans. The CSCE indicator rose modestly from its most recent low, improved by slight gains in financial health and household spending intentions. But perceptions of labour market conditions deteriorated further, driven in part by a sharp drop in job-finding prospects for public sector workers. Consumers’ short-term inflation expectations remain above their pre-pandemic averages, and expectations for longer-term inflation have picked up again.

This is an account of the deliberations of the Bank of Canada’s Governing Council leading to the monetary policy decision on September 17, 2025.

New technologies new payments possibilities. Learn more about how these innovations can make purchases easier, but also introduce new risks.

Quarterly Financial Report - Second Quarter 2025 - For the period ended June 30, 2025, unaudited

This is an account of the deliberations of the Bank of Canada’s Governing Council leading to the monetary policy decision on July 30, 2025.

The Market Participants Survey results are based on questionnaire responses from about 30 financial market participants.

Tariffs are significantly higher than they were at the start of 2025, and it is extremely difficult to predict how US trade policy will play out. Canadian economic activity has slowed but is showing signs of resilience. While inflation is close to 2%, underlying inflation has picked up.

Tariffs and related uncertainty continue to weigh on firms, according to results from the Business Outlook Survey and the Business Leaders’ Pulse. While overall sales outlooks remain weak, outlooks for exports have recovered somewhat, with worst-case trade scenarios appearing less likely. Firms remain cautious in their hiring and investment plans. Some businesses reported cost pressures from tariffs, but competition and weak demand are constraining price pass-through to customers. In this context, firms’ short-term inflation expectations are lower than they were last quarter.

Overall, results of the second-quarter 2025 survey show that the CSCE indicator—a measure developed to summarize the opinions of Canadian consumers—declined again this quarter as spending intentions continued to weaken due to the persistent threats of tariffs and related uncertainty. Consumers still see the labour market as soft, and their fear of job loss is elevated. The trade conflict is leading consumers to become increasingly cautious about their spending plans and to change their spending behaviour. Consumers’ short-term inflation expectations have changed little since increasing markedly in the first quarter of 2025. This quarter, more consumers cited tariffs as the most important factor affecting the Bank of Canada’s ability to control inflation.