The Canadian dollar traded mixed at first, but took the top spot among the major currencies. It was lifted by a bounce in oil prices on Thursday, as well as positive economic updates from Canada at the end of the week.
Canada Headlines and Economic data
Monday:
Canada Building Permits Fall 14.6% in October – “The previous month’s data was revised to show building permits increased 18.6% in September, compared with a previous estimate of a 17% advance.”
Canada Current Account Deficit Widens in 3Q to C$7.53 Billion
Prices for animals and animal products increased 2.6%, mostly due to higher prices for hogs (+16.9%); strong global demand for pork is responsible for supporting these higher hog prices.
Crop product prices were up 3.1%, led by increases in prices for other crop products (+3.2%), canola (+3.4%) and wheat (+7.5%). Strong demand from China, as well as concerns about production and cold winter weather played a part in these price increases.
Tuesday:
Sharp expansion in Canadian manufacturing output maintained in November
Canadian economy notches record growth in third quarter – “Canada’s Q3 annualized growth soared 40.5%, rebounding from a historic plunge in the second quarter, while September real GDP rose by 0.8%.”
Wednesday:
Record decline in Canadian labor productivity following record increase the previous quarter – Labour productivity of Canadian businesses dropped -10.3% in the third quarter vs. +10.5% in the second quarter
Thursday:
OPEC+ agrees slight easing of oil cuts from January – “OPEC and Russia on Thursday agreed to slightly ease their deep oil output cuts from January by 500,000 barrels per day”
Friday:
Canada added 62,100 jobs in the month, triple the median forecast in a Bloomberg survey and down only modestly from the 83,600 gain in October – “The labor market has recovered 81% of the 3 million positions lost during March and April.”
Oil moves up towards $50/barrel after OPEC+ supply compromise
