Bank of Canada expected to raise its key rate for first time in nearly seven years + MORE Jul 11th

Following Ottawa’s landscape-changing insurance rules last fall, the Department of Finance has raised little concern about the prime uninsured mortgage market, at least publicly. Nor should it—at least with respect to the uninsured market overall. By and large, uninsured borrowers are: in a safe equity position financed without direct government backing, unlike default insured borrowers underwritten reasonably conservatively—as measured by international standards and […]

The Bank of Canada is expected to raise its key interest rate target for the first time in nearly seven years on Wednesday following signs the economy is well on the road to recovery after the crash in oil prices.
Low interest rates have helped fuel the housing market in recent years, incentivizing Canadians to pile on record levels of debt _ something that the central bank has noted as a significant risk for the economy.
Rates for new fixed-rate mortgages have already started to rise in anticipation. A hike by the Bank of Canada will likely prompt the country’s big banks to raise their prime rates, a move that will increase the cost of loans such as variable rate mortgages and home equity lines of credit.
James Laird, co-founder of interest rate comparison website RateHub, said the carefully crafted language the Bank of Canada uses Wednesday will be key in reading the tea leaves of future rate decisions.
“Any additional comments for future increases will be the real trigger for more fixed rate increases following the announcement, rather than the rate change itself,” Laird said…

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. says the annual pace of housing starts in Canada picked up in June.
The seasonally adjusted annual rate of housing starts in June came in at 212,695 units, up from 194,955 units in May.
Economists had expected tha annual rate to come in at 200,000, according to Thomson Reuters.
The overall increase came as the pace of urban starts increased by 9.6 per cent to 194,773 units. Multi-unit urban starts increased by 9.4 per cent to 127,944, while single-detached urban starts increased by 10.1 per cent to 66,829.
Rural starts were estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 17,922 units.
The six-month moving average of the monthly seasonally adjusted annual rates increased to 215,459 in compared with 214,570 in May.
The post CMHC says annual pace of housing starts picked up in June appeared first on Canadian Business – Your Source For Business News.

Workers in the so-called gig economy, from Uber drivers to delivery cyclists, need greater labour protections, according to flagship review published Tuesday that underscores fears of growing insecurity in the workforce.
The study by Matthew Taylor, a former adviser to Tony Blair, concluded that a new category of worker _ the “dependent contractor” _ should be created to secure genuine flexibility for labourers.
While some workers in the gig economy like the flexibility, others suffer from job security in contracts that, for example, offer no guarantee on the number of hours to be worked. Such insecurity can make it hard, say, to get a mortgage _ even when someone is in regular work.
“There’s nothing wrong with zero and low hours contracts but they should be a means to two-way flexibility, not a lazy way for those with market power to dump risk on those who lack that power,” he said.
The report signals a new norm among the workforce, though labour researchers have struggled to count the number of independent workers…

The Bank of Canada has strongly hinted it could hike the key interest rate.