Canada, economy, opinion, predictions

IMF pessimistic on Canadian outlook

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80 Comments

The IMF has put on their grumpy pants and come out against the Canadian Economy again, so says the Globe and Mail.

Markets worldwide reacted with some shock to the news, posting modest declines. But the Toronto Stock Exchange took a bigger hit than most others, falling 1.2 per cent.

The Canadian stock market has been sluggish, relative to other leading global markets, as economic doubts have risen this year. The TSX has grown just 2.7 per cent to date in 2012, compared with a 14.6 per cent jump in the S&P 500 and even 6.7 per cent growth in the Euro Stoxx index.

“We’ve been saying for a while that the Canadian stock market would underperform,” said Pierre Lapointe, the head of global strategy and research for Pavilion Global Markets Ltd. “It has. And we continue to think that it will underperform.”

The IMF report focused heavily on Canada’s deeply entrenched trade relationship with the United States. While Canada’s recovery has been faster, “growth has been constrained by sluggish expansion in the United States,” the report said.

Read the full article here.

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Anonymous

@MM: …..In other words: leave us alone in our small-town bubble. Live somewhere else. And go work and create jobs somewhere else…….

Well there’s no denying it, Vancouver is a world class small town.

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exwestender

Here’s a nice fat salmon for RE bears, i.e. an article on the CMHC’s valuation database used by banks for mortgage approvals. Not so much of an issue in a hot market, but worrisome to banks when prices are dropping.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/potentially-flawed-data-used-by-banks-and-lenders-bump-up-house-prices/article4603237/

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real_professional

I have to agree… more and more people are finding work outside of the downtown core, and I am making reference to professional services. Companies can get better rents and can be closer to their employees and in some cases their clintele by moving east. Downtown Vancouver really isn’t close to anything and is as Central to the GVRD as UBC is.

Vancouverites often believe moving inland is a trade off and that everyone wants to live in Vancouver proper. This is not true. People want to live close to work, facilities, have affordable access to transportation, and close to a social network. If you have all of tha why would you live anywhere but the burbs?

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Bailing in BC

@Vote Down The Facts:

Actually the writer does say where he lives, he lives in Beijing. He looks about 30 in his photo (perhaps it’s old?)

Are you saying that to have fun in Vancouver you have to be the right age, live in the right place and KNOW where to go?

Someone the right age, in the right place who knows where to go could have fun anywhere, one imagines.

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painted turtle

http://www.straight.com/article-805306/vancouver/real-estate-squeeze-play

And according to several people contacted by the Straight this month, it appears that Toronto bankers are far less keen to underwrite projects unless developers can pony up more money up front to justify the risk.

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gordholio

rp1: Great find, great piece. I wonder….a year ago, would this article even see the light of day?

I’m annoyed though how they soften it: “If the market starts to fall”?

“If”?

Good god, there’s no “if” about it.

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Vote Down The Facts

@Bailing in BC:

I agree. I never line up for anything, but still have fun – because I know where to go. The author of that article doesn’t say where they live or how old they are, so it’s hard to say what their point of reference is. The whole thing reads like a troll.

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Bailing in BC

@rp1:

How could anyone have seen that coming? “Watya mean we can’t guess a house price by postal code?”

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Bailing in BC

@Vote Down The Facts:

Lining up is not fun. A fun night out is not one where you line up for 45 minutes (which they did)and then pay a cover charge so that when you do get in you have to stay, otherwise you wasted your time and your money. The world class entertainment districts are places where you can float from one place to the next until you find a place you just can’t leave coz you’re having too much fun.

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painted turtle

@rp1

Thanks for this article!

So there IS NO BUBBLE, just a bug in Emili. Everyone makes more money (the lender, the realtor, the seller) during an overpriced transaction, but at the end it is no one’s fault. It is all because of a crapy software. May be they should sue the software developer for creating a housing bubble 😉

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Anonymous

@ Laibach

In Vancouver, all the fun is in the burbs. Let the immigrants buy up the core. It’s overpriced and boring, but don’t tell them. The beaches, best one of a kind coffee shops, biggest churches, cultural centres, outdoor markets.
Even the new Apple store in Coquitlam blows away the tiny one downtown. Oh and one more thing….I can PARK MY CAR.

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Vote Down The Facts

@Laibach:

That article is funny. They say they didn’t have fun, but it sounds like they never even got into a venue where people were enjoying themselves because they couldnt be bothered to line up. Gastown quiet on a Saturday? Gimme a break.

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Laibach

Has this been posted so far, I haven’t been around recently?

How could a city often cited as one of the world’s prettiest and most livable be such a black hole of boring?

There’s the ludicrously expensive housing prices downtown and shortage of young professionals — like in New York or Toronto — that would create the demand for world-class dining and nightlife options in the core. (Vancouver only has 600,000 people; the metro area has 2.3 million.)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mitch-moxley/welcome-to-vancouver-no-fun_b_1931606.html

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Brittanny

Harper is very big own his own ideas, just like Bush was. ” I know what is best for the general public” He ultimately sets the policy for Canada.

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Anonymous

We may never hit 20k this year but the inventory has been stuck around 19k for a long time. How many times we hit 19k this year? 3 times?

I think this is just as bad as 20k. We just have many owners who refuse to “give away for free”, take their listings off the market, and hope to rent out/re-list next spring.

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rp1

#52 @patriotz: “Plus banks are likely to add to the spread between mortgage and GoC rates because of lesser availability of CMHC insurance (less competitive pressure) and increased costs to them in a falling RE market.”

Don’t forget profitability. If loan volumes fall, they will make it up on spread. I pity the foo’ who in debt to them.

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ScubaSteve

(Let’s try that again… formatted so it is easier to read… see if this works)

Here are the average prices/sales so far for each day, from Rob Chipman’s site.

Oct-01     92       $695,277       $63,965,484
Oct-02     135     $806,875     $108,928,125
Oct-03     90       $731,325       $65,819,250
Oct-04     67       $701,911       $47,028,037
Oct-05     73       $681,790       $49,770,670
Oct-09     119     $710,523       $84,552,237
Oct-10     73       $688,073       $50,229,329
Total        649     $724,643     $470,293,132

We are currently sitting at an average price of $724,643. That is scarily almost exactly the same as last month, but it is -5.75% YoY. Here are the MoM and YoY comparisons for average prices:

Sep/2012 = $724,650
Oct/2011 = $768,860

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MM

@real_professional: According to Vancouver Sun, Vancouver should remain a time-capsule of small-town SFHs living. It’s the suburbs that should densify: http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Vancouver+city+that+acts+like+suburb/7359718/story.html

And “make ingress into Vancouver more difficult, not easier. Keep the bridge and tunnel bottlenecks as they are. Force the suburbs to urbanize and infill.”

In other words: leave us alone in our small-town bubble. Live somewhere else. And go work and create jobs somewhere else.

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ScubaSteve

Here are the average prices/sales so far for each day, from Rob Chipman’s site.

——————————————

Oct-01 92 $695,277 $63,965,484
Oct-02 135 $806,875 $108,928,125
Oct-03 90 $731,325 $65,819,250
Oct-04 67 $701,911 $47,028,037
Oct-05 73 $681,790 $49,770,670

Oct-09 119 $710,523 $84,552,237
Oct-10 73 $688,073 $50,229,329

Total 649 $724,643 $470,293,132

——————————————

We are currently sitting at an average price of $724,643. That is scarily almost exactly the same as last month, but it is -5.75% YoY. Here are the MoM and YoY comparisons for average prices:

Sep/2012 = $724,650
Oct/2011 = $768,860

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HAM Solo

@ scuba

Interesting now we are starting to lap Oct 2011, which was when the really abnormally high listings started. Difference this year is lower sales volumes.

As I recall, last November and December had oddly high listings, too. I suspect that is going to continue

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ScubaSteve

Updated sales chart:

http://i49.tinypic.com/2vm7gxi.jpg

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VHB

Got our double digit MoI back.

Total days	22
Days elapsed so far	7
Weekends / holidays	3
Days missing	0
Days remaining	15
7 Calendar Day Moving Average: Sales	83
7 Calendar Day Moving Average: Listings	246
SALES	
Sales so far	649
Projection for rest of month (using 7day MA)	1245
Projected month end total	1894
NEW LISTINGS	
Listings so far	1808
Projection for rest of month (using 7day MA)	3683
Projected month end total	5491
Sell-list so far	35.9%
Projected month-end sell-list	34.5%
MONTHS OF INVENTORY	
Inventory as of October 10, 2012	19032
Current MoI at this sales pace	10.05
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mclovin

Happy 19K everyone!

Gotta love that sell/list %.

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Ray

19K! Again!

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