Canada – Mid-May 2025 Snapshot
Private-Debt Momentum:
• Franklin Templeton Canada / Lexington Partners launched a retail private-credit fund
• Sagard bought into BEX Capital to deepen secondary-credit reach
• Bitfarms & Rogers Communications raised ≈ C$ 700 m in fresh private debt
• Énergir (6 May) placed C$ 300 m of 30-year first-mortgage bonds at 4.65 %, showing strong appetite for long-dated IG paper
Housing & Mortgages: April housing starts jumped 30 % (278 600 units); Montréal & Victoria prices up ~8 % y/y as variable-rate borrowers brace for higher renewals
Tariff Deadlock: A fifth Ottawa-Washington round ended with no progress; 25 % duties on most goods remain, pushing Ontario layoffs higher and the national unemployment rate to 6.9 %.
Key Canadian Market Indices
- S&P/TSX Composite 🟢 +1.30%
- S&P/TSX 60 🟢 +1.25%
United States – Key Developments
- Moody’s Downgrade (16 May): U.S. sovereign debt downgraded to AA1, leaving America below triple-A at all three major agencies
- Tariff Reset Draft: White House outlines a blanket 10 % base tariff for countries without bilateral deals; China & UK retain exemptions
- Boeing Mega-Order: Qatar Airways signs US $ 96 bn deal for up to 210 wide-body jets, supporting an estimated 400 000 U.S. jobs
- China Truce: 90-day tariff pause—U.S. duties fall 145 % → 30 %, China’s to 10 %—to allow broader negotiations
Markets at a Glance (week ending 17 May 2025)
- S&P 500 – 🟢 +5.27 % Tech-led rally
- Nasdaq – 🟢 +6.81 % AI megacaps
- Dow Jones – 🟢 +3.41 % Industrials bid
- 10Y Treasury – 🟢 4.44 % +1.41 bp
Bitcoin (BRR) – 🔴 -0.24 %, US$ 103 885.6
Why It Matters
- Canada: Private‑loan markets are healthy, so businesses there can still find money on good terms.
- United States: After the recent credit‑rating cut, investors may demand higher yields, so borrowing could get pricier.
- Cross‑border trade: Tariffs between the two countries aren’t going away soon, so exporters and importers need to build those costs into their prices.
- Aerospace & heavy industry: Boeing’s big new order should give suppliers a short‑term sales bump, which helps offset the hit from rising interest costs
Interest‑rate outlook: Whatever the Bank of Canada and the U.S. Federal Reserve signal about future rate moves will largely determine how easy—or expensive—it is to borrow on either side of the border.
