OTTAWA, ON (June 5, 2018): The Macdonald-Laurier Institute’s Leading Economic Indicator, a tool designed to predict changes in the Canadian business cycle, edged up by 0.1 percent for the third consecutive month in April.
Five of the ten components advanced, one was unchanged and four retreated.
“After a brief rally at year-end before more restrictive mortgage regulations took effect,” says Munk Senior Fellow Philip Cross, the author of the LEI, “the decline in the housing index deepened for the fourth straight month, with a 4.0 percent drop in April.”
The housing slump was accompanied by a lowering of the Bloomberg index of consumer attitudes. Growth continued to be supported by gains in the US economy, which helped buttress new orders for goods manufactured in Canada and commodity prices.
Cross concludes: “Overall, the leading index points to the slow growth in Canada’s economy early in 2018 continuing into the middle of the year.”
To learn more about the leading economic indicator, click here.
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Brett Byers-Lane
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613-482-8327 x105
brett.byers-lane@macdonaldlaurier.ca
