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The five articles in this issue present research and analysis by Bank staff covering a variety of topics: the growth of Canadian-dollar-denominated assets in official foreign reserves; the emergence of platform-based digital currencies; methods of forecasting the real price of oil; measures of uncertainty in monetary policy; and the recent performance of the labour market in Canada and the United States.

Six months ago, at the time of the last Monetary Policy Report, the global economic and financial environment was volatile and highly uncertain because of the adverse situation in Asia and the fallout from the Russian debt moratorium.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused an atypical recession in which some sectors of the economy boomed and others collapsed. This required a unique fiscal policy reaction to both support firms and stimulate activity in sectors with slack. Was fiscal policy able to get where it was needed? Mostly, yes.

This Report outlines recent developments in the Canadian economy that affect the rate of inflation and provides an account of the measures taken by the Bank of Canada to control inflation.

Growth in the global economy began to slow in the fourth quarter of 2007 and the first quarter of 2008. This reflected the effects of the slowdown in the U.S. economy and ongoing dislocations in global financial markets.

At the time of the November 2000 Monetary Policy Report, although signs of the anticipated slowing of the U.S. economy were becoming apparent, the momentum of the global economy was considered strong.

During the past six months, global economic uncertainties have intensified, largely as a result of developments in emerging-market economies.

Since the May Report, the international economic environment has continued to improve. Economic activity abroad grew faster than expected, while inflation in the major economies remained subdued.

The global economy has continued to grow at a robust pace since the July Monetary Policy Report Update.

The Canadian economy continues to adjust to major global developments.