About Sherry

Dr. Sherry Cooper live on CTV discussing global market turmoil as oil prices plunge.

Global Markets in Turmoil, Oil Prices Plunge Along With Yields Markets shuddered in the face of a price war for oil and the economic fallout from the growing outbreak of coronavirus. Frightened investors poured into haven assets sending yields to unprecedented lows. Oil prices tumbled 30% after Saudi Arabia said it would cut most of…

Dr. Sherry Cooper discusses the Bank of Canada rate cut and subsequent Canadian mortgage rate drop on CTV News.

Steady February Job Market Ahead of Virus Scare Job growth in Canada remained robust last month with net employment gains of 30,300 – all of which were in private-sector full-time jobs. The unemployment rate rose a tick to 5.6%, but that is still down from a year ago and around multi-decade lows. The positive news…

The Bank of Canada Brings Out The Big Guns Following yesterday’s surprise emergency 50 basis point (bp) rate cut by the Fed, the Bank of Canada followed suit today and signalled it is poised to do more if necessary. The BoC lowered its target for the overnight rate by 50 bps to 1.25%, suggesting that…

The Fed Brings Out The Big Guns In a remarkable show of force, the US Federal Reserve jumped the gun on its regularly scheduled meeting on March 18 and cut the target overnight fed funds rate by a full 50 basis points (bps) to 1%-to-1.25%. This now stands well below the Bank of Canada’s target rate…

Virus Anxiety and The Canadian Housing Market As though things weren’t volatile enough, a new wave of virus terror is wreaking havoc on global financial markets. The novel conronavirus, COVID-19, continues to spread causing panic in worldwide stock and bond markets for the seventh day. Share prices have plummetted in Asia, Europe, the U.S. and…

Minister Morneau Announces New Benchmark Rate for Qualifying For Insured Mortgages The new qualifying rate will be the mortgage contract rate or a newly created benchmark very close to it plus 200 basis points, in either case. The News Release from the Department of Finance Canada states, “the Government of Canada has introduced measures to…

Home Sales Slip A Bit In January As Supply Tightens Pushing Up Prices Statistics released today by the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) show that national existing-home sales dipped between December and January owing to a dearth of new listings, especially in the GTA. As the CREA chart below shows, the pace of monthly home…

January Starts 2020 With Strong Canadian Job Growth January follows December in erasing the weak November job numbers providing good news for the Canadian economy. Manufacturing led the way as the jobless rate fell, and wage growth accelerated meaningfully. The robust labour market, coupled with consumer confidence holding firm in January at about historical averages,…