Being a Saturday in October 2008, we can look back on this past week and see a few of the burning issues that have bubbled out of the Financial Cauldron:
- A recovery may be on the horizon for equities, but this is only good news if you were out of the market, if you stayed in, this just means you might get some value back.
- Much talk of doom and gloom in terms of jobs and lay offs coming in all industries.
- Governments at all levels in Canada talking about deficit financing again, and how the downturn may force governments to start running deficit budgets.
- The RBC brain trust commenting that there will be another 1/2 point interest rate drop next week from the Bank of Canada. Can we reach a negative interest position?
- An interesting posting talking about how only 45% of Canadians are thinking of getting TFSA accounts in the new year.
- Mutual Fund redemption at almost a “run” rate with funds being sold off at a very high rate.
- The Canadian Loonie which was at $1.10 in the early spring is now down to 84 cents to the American Greenback, due to commodity price drops.
On the positive side of things, lower interest rates is always a good thing if you are a debtor like me. Lower gas prices are very good (in Ottawa below 95 cents a liter has been seen), but what will this do to the consumer price index? Will we have a negative CPI soon? Deflation coming?
All interesting questions to think about in the coming week.
The memory is the second thing to go……..
It was November last when the Loonie peaked. I was fortunate to have purchased several thousands of dollars of goods ordered months earlier which came due in November!
DAvid