Canadian yield curve disinverts as Macklem, U.S. Fed eye cuts
Canada's benchmark two-year yield briefly dropped below the 10year for the first time in more than two years, as traders looked ahead to United States Federal Reserve cuts and Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem made dovish comments to the Financial Times.
Canada two-year notes dropped as low as 2.862 per cent on Monday, the lowest level since June 2022 and down about 150 basis points since late May.
Falling yields and the disinversion of the curve reflect the rapid change in expectations for short-term interest rates in North America. Economists, markets and central bankers are increasingly convinced that a two-year campaign of aggressive monetary tightening has largely snuffed out inflation pressures.
As a result, there's less of a need for borrowing costs to keep restricting growth. Swap markets show traders expect the Fed to cut by at least a quarter-point on Wednesday, with about a 50 per cent chance of a half-point cut.
The Bank of Canada has already cut rates three times since June, bringing the benchmark overnight rate to 4.25 per cent, and officials have signalled more to come. Economists see mounting weakness in the labour market, and some of them are calling on policy-makers to start making bigger moves to bring down borrowing costs.
Macklem told the Financial Times in an interview that there's “enough slack in the economy” to get back to the two per cent inflation target and policy-makers “don't want to see further or sustained weakness in the labour market.”
He also reiterated that it “could be appropriate to move faster” on interest rates. Speaking to reporters on Sept. 4, Macklem said policy-makers had also discussed a scenario in which the economy and inflation surprise to the upside and the bank reduces the pace of easing.
Traders in overnight swaps have also upped their bets for a larger-than-normal reduction at the central bank's Oct. 23 decision. Swaps markets put the odds of a
50-basis point cut at around 50 per cent.
Markets expect rates in Canada to fall to about 2.5 per cent by July of next year — more than 50 basis points lower than they were pricing a month ago.
“Unfortunately for bears, there is no mystic in the curve besides the monetary policy cycle,” Fred Demers, investment strategist at BMO Asset Management, said in an email.
The yield curve only signals
that policy is set to loosen, and is “mostly removing the knife on the throat” of the economy, he said.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expect yearly price pressures to fall to 2.1 per cent, which would be the lowest since February 2021.
The country's unemployment rate unexpectedly jumped to 6.6 per cent in August, and third-quarter growth is expected to be lower than the central bank's forecasts.