Mortgage Watch

The stubbornly strong loonie is the major impediment to the Canadian economy rebounding more strongly from the recent deep recession, says Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney.

In a new warning about the currency that is approaching parity with the U.S. greenback, Carney says Canada would experience noticeably stronger recovery next year and in 2011 if the loonie had stayed at the 87-cent level the bank envisaged in the summer.

Carney said Thursday that's why the bank made it clear this week that barring an unforeseen spike in inflation, it will keep interest rates at the historic low of 0.25 per cent until at least next July.

Carney said the central bank has several tools at its disposal, including intervention in the currency market, but didn't specify which would be put to use.

"Intervention is always an option," he said.

"Markets should take seriously our determination to set policy to achieve the inflation target. Markets sometimes lose their focus. We don't lose our focus."

The loonie closed 0.16 of a cent lower at 95.44 cents US on Thursday, but many expect it to hit parity with the greenback in the next few months, mainly because of weakness in the American dollar, which has dropped against most of the world's major currencies.

A high loonie makes it cheaper to take U.S. vacations and buy imported goods. But it also harms the Canadian manufacturing sector because it makes exports of everything from minerals and metals to newsprint, machinery and lumber more expensive for buyers in the United States, Canada's main export market.

Carney called the loonie's persistent rise since July "the major downside risk" to the economy, noting that although the loonie was higher two years ago, the difference now is that it comes during a period of severe economic weakness.

His comments came after the central bank issued a comprehensive 28-page quarterly review of the global economy, showing a sharp rebound is underway, fuelled by government stimulus and the need to restock depleted inventories.

But in Canada, the strong burst in activity will last at most a few months more before giving way to the slow and difficult climb back from the deep hole that the recession dug over the past year, the review adds.

The bank is more optimistic about the second half of this year than it was three months ago, noting modest employment gains in August and September.

In a supporting report, Statistics Canada announced that retail sales jumped 0.8 per cent in August to $34.5 billion, largely as a result of strong activity at new car dealerships and at gas stations.

"When the labour market fares well, good things tend to happen to the rest of the Canadian economy," said CIBC economist Krishen Rangasamy.

The domestic economy is now expected to record a two-per-cent gain in the third quarter - the July-September period - and 3.3 per cent during the last three months of this year. The Bank of Canada's July forecast called for growth of 1.3 per cent and three per cent, in the third and fourth quarters respectively.

A number of things have broken right for Canada to make this happen. Commodity prices, particularly oil, have firmed up, financial markets have stabilized faster than thought, and the global economy, particularly China, has rebounded quicker and stronger than expected.