The Bank of Canada might have have cut interest rates this week if it was confident we wouldn’t go on another debt binge.
But it wasn’t, so it left the benchmark rate at 1.75 per cent even as it cut its outlook for economic growth in 2020, predicting the trade wars will cause exports and business investment to temporarily contract in the near term.
“Governing Council considered whether the downside risks to the Canadian economy were sufficient at this time to warrant a more accommodative monetary policy as a form of insurance against those risks, and we concluded that the were not,” Stephen Poloz, the governor, said in prepared remarks ahead of his quarterly press conference in Ottawa on Oct. 30.