There’s always that one thing everyone failed to anticipate that ends up reverberating through the economy. For Canada, it’s the collapse in crude oil prices.
And some things that were less worrisome when oil traded near triple digits are obviously much more so today, such as the ratio of debt to disposable income among Canadian consumers. According to Statistics Canada (StatCan), that figure set a new all-time high in the fourth quarter of 163.3%, up from 162.7% in third quarter.
The debt component is tallied by summing total debt outstanding on mortgages, credit cards, and other loans. So it’s easy to imagine how the country’s housing bubble has caused debt to balloon, especially given the news that the average price of a detached home in Toronto exceeded CAD1 million for the first time in February.
But the growth in debt isn’t the only problem. With an already-weak economy battered by crude’s bear market, income growth is now slowing.
We’re still only starting to get a sense of how crude’s decline will affect the broader economy.
The resource-rich province of Alberta will certainly feel it first and hardest. Falling crude first hits the financials of the companies that operate in that province’s energy sector.
As we’ve seen already with the steady stream of announcements of dramatically lower capital-spending budgets, energy producers will do what it takes to tighten spending.
And that leads to lower demand for goods and services from companies outside the province. As Bank of Canada Deputy Governor Carolyn Wilkins recently noted, “Nearly one-third of the goods and services purchased by the Alberta energy industry are drawn from other provinces–and so are the workers.”
More important, budget cuts also lead to lower incomes and rising unemployment.
StatCan reports that Alberta shed 14,000 jobs in February, pushing its unemployment rate up by eight-tenths of a percentage point, to 5.3%, the highest level in more than three years. In the province’s resource sector, employment has decreased by 20,000 since its recent peak last September.
Facing a worsening job market, even those consumers who are still employed will start to rein in their spending, maybe on little things like going out to eat or on big things, such as buying a house.
Policymakers have long been worried about Canada’s housing bubble and have been working to engineer a soft landing. It’s true that Canada’s approach to housing finance is far more conservative than in the U.S., so we shouldn’t extrapolate our own experiences here to what’s in store for the Great White North.
But as falling crude begets slowing income growth and rising unemployment, that could very well make the soft landing harder. The Canadian Real Estate Association is already projecting that fallout from the resource sector’s collapse, particularly in Western Canada, will cause sales nationwide to decline by 1.1% in 2015.
Still, real estate markets are regional, and strength in other provinces, particularly in British Columbia and Ontario, is expected to push the average price of a home another 2% higher this year, to CAD416,200.
To be sure, Canadians are still managing their obligations responsibly. Diana Petramal, an economist with Toronto-Dominion Bank, says credit card delinquency rates are at record-low levels, while only 0.28% of mortgages were past due by 90 days or longer as of October.
Part of the story, according to Bank of Montreal economists Douglas Porter and Benjamin Reitzes, is that Canadians’ net financial assets have nearly doubled since the Global Financial Crisis, while household debt is up by 38% over that same period. A narrow focus on income clearly leaves out other sources of financial strength.
The Bank of Canada expects gross domestic product (GDP) growth will slow markedly during the first half of the year, before a moderate rebound in the second half. So the next few months (and their aftermath) will be a true test of whether Canadian consumers can continue shouldering their debt burdens.
And some things that were less worrisome when oil traded near triple digits are obviously much more so today, such as the ratio of debt to disposable income among Canadian consumers. According to Statistics Canada (StatCan), that figure set a new all-time high in the fourth quarter of 163.3%, up from 162.7% in third quarter.
The debt component is tallied by summing total debt outstanding on mortgages, credit cards, and other loans. So it’s easy to imagine how the country’s housing bubble has caused debt to balloon, especially given the news that the average price of a detached home in Toronto exceeded CAD1 million for the first time in February.
But the growth in debt isn’t the only problem. With an already-weak economy battered by crude’s bear market, income growth is now slowing.
We’re still only starting to get a sense of how crude’s decline will affect the broader economy.
The resource-rich province of Alberta will certainly feel it first and hardest. Falling crude first hits the financials of the companies that operate in that province’s energy sector.
As we’ve seen already with the steady stream of announcements of dramatically lower capital-spending budgets, energy producers will do what it takes to tighten spending.
And that leads to lower demand for goods and services from companies outside the province. As Bank of Canada Deputy Governor Carolyn Wilkins recently noted, “Nearly one-third of the goods and services purchased by the Alberta energy industry are drawn from other provinces–and so are the workers.”
More important, budget cuts also lead to lower incomes and rising unemployment.
StatCan reports that Alberta shed 14,000 jobs in February, pushing its unemployment rate up by eight-tenths of a percentage point, to 5.3%, the highest level in more than three years. In the province’s resource sector, employment has decreased by 20,000 since its recent peak last September.
Facing a worsening job market, even those consumers who are still employed will start to rein in their spending, maybe on little things like going out to eat or on big things, such as buying a house.
Policymakers have long been worried about Canada’s housing bubble and have been working to engineer a soft landing. It’s true that Canada’s approach to housing finance is far more conservative than in the U.S., so we shouldn’t extrapolate our own experiences here to what’s in store for the Great White North.
But as falling crude begets slowing income growth and rising unemployment, that could very well make the soft landing harder. The Canadian Real Estate Association is already projecting that fallout from the resource sector’s collapse, particularly in Western Canada, will cause sales nationwide to decline by 1.1% in 2015.
Still, real estate markets are regional, and strength in other provinces, particularly in British Columbia and Ontario, is expected to push the average price of a home another 2% higher this year, to CAD416,200.
To be sure, Canadians are still managing their obligations responsibly. Diana Petramal, an economist with Toronto-Dominion Bank, says credit card delinquency rates are at record-low levels, while only 0.28% of mortgages were past due by 90 days or longer as of October.
Part of the story, according to Bank of Montreal economists Douglas Porter and Benjamin Reitzes, is that Canadians’ net financial assets have nearly doubled since the Global Financial Crisis, while household debt is up by 38% over that same period. A narrow focus on income clearly leaves out other sources of financial strength.
The Bank of Canada expects gross domestic product (GDP) growth will slow markedly during the first half of the year, before a moderate rebound in the second half. So the next few months (and their aftermath) will be a true test of whether Canadian consumers can continue shouldering their debt burdens.
