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The consumption boom-bust cycle in the 2000s coincided with large fluctuations in the volume of home equity borrowing. Contrary to conventional wisdom, I show that homeowners largely borrowed for residential investment and not consumption.

This article describes changes to the structure of ToTEM—the Bank of Canada’s main model for projection and policy analysis—that allow an independent role for long-term interest rates, as well as for the risk spreads that lead to differences in the interest rates faced by households, firms and the government. These changes broaden the range of policy questions that the model can address and improve its ability to explain data. The authors use the model to simulate the effects of shocks to the risk spreads on interest rates similar to those that occurred during the recent financial crisis. They also use the model to assess the macroeconomic impact of higher requirements for bank capital and liquidity.

The Bank of Canada today announced that it is maintaining its target for the overnight rate at 2 1/2 per cent. The operating band for the overnight rate is unchanged, and the Bank Rate remains at 2 3/4 per cent.

The Bank of Canada has signed a contract with EDS Canada Inc. for the provision of systems and operations support services for the federal government's retail debt program to ensure more flexible and cost-effective service.

The Bank of Canada announced today that it is closing its Optical Security Material (OSM) division and selling all of its related assets.

Exceptional strength in the housing market during the pandemic is underpinning Canada’s economic recovery. However, two key vulnerabilities—housing market imbalances and elevated household indebtedness—have intensified.

Rising housing costs are leading to an increasing share of first-time homebuyers seeking financial support from their parents. Specifically, Canada has experienced a noticeable rise in instances of parents co-signing mortgages with their adult children. This practice allows buyers to purchase more expensive homes—but it can also make both parties vulnerable to financial disruptions.

What risks could stablecoins pose to the financial system? We argue that the stabilization mechanisms of stablecoins give rise to the risk of confidence runs, which can propagate to broader cryptoasset markets and the traditional financial sector. We also argue that stablecoins can contribute to financial stability risks by facilitating the buildup of leverage and liquidity mismatch in decentralized finance. Such risks cannot be addressed by ensuring the price stability of stablecoins alone. Finally, we explore the potential implications of stablecoins for the current system of bank-intermediated credit and for monetary policy.

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.

In this paper, we estimate the effect on housing prices of the expansion of the Vancouver SkyTrain rapid transit network during the period 2001–11. We extend the canonical residential sorting equilibrium framework to include commuting time in the household utility function.