Skip to main content

Featured

Canada’s Inflation Rebounds to 2.4% in December After Tax Holiday Effect Fades

Food prices were expected to rise on a year-over-year basis because December 2024 restaurant prices had been lowered by the temporary GST holiday that ended in early 2025.  Canada’s annual inflation rate accelerated to 2.4% in December , coming in hotter than economists expected and marking a noticeable uptick from November’s 2.2%. The increase was driven largely by a “base‑year effect” tied to last year’s temporary federal GST/HST holiday, which had artificially lowered prices during the same period a year earlier. With those discounts no longer part of the comparison, categories such as restaurant meals, alcohol, and children’s goods appeared more expensive on a year‑over‑year basis, pushing the headline inflation figure higher. Despite the jump, underlying price pressures continued to ease. Key core inflation measures — which strip out volatile items — cooled for the third straight month, suggesting that broader inflation momentum is still slowing. Month‑to‑month, consumer pr...

article

US stocks hope for economic stability after record highs

 


The US stock market has been on a roll this year, with the S&P 500 index up by 17% and hovering around 6% below its record high from January 2022. The market’s performance in the coming weeks will depend on how confident investors are that the US economy will experience a soft landing..

A soft landing is a scenario where the economy slows down moderately without going into a recession . Morgan Stanley Research believes that the US economy can achieve a soft landing, given the current housing cycle, income and spending trends, a stable labor market, and receding inflation. However, banking-sector turmoil and a resulting credit squeeze still pose some recession risk.

The recent stock market rally has Wall Street re-examining the potential for the US economy to pull off a soft landing scenario. Goldman Sachs expects the economy to react positively to the Fed’s monetary policy in 2024.

It’s worth noting that the stock market is not always a reliable indicator of the economy’s health. Therefore, investors should be cautious and not celebrate too soon.



Comments