Wednesday morning news drop
Bank of Canada maintains policy rate and forward guidance, adjusts quantitative easing program The Bank of Canada today held its target for the overnight rate at the effective lower bound of ¼ percent, with the Bank Rate at ½ percent and the deposit rate at ¼ percent. The Bank is maintaining its extraordinary forward guidance on the path for the overnight rate. This is reinforced and supplemented by the Bank’s quantitative easing (QE) program, which is being adjusted to a target pace of $2 billion per week. This adjustment reflects continued progress towards recovery and the Bank’s increased confidence in the strength of the Canadian economic outlook. (Bank of Canada)
Lumber prices drop again as customers hold off purchasing It is usual that the dual national holiday weeks, Canada Day and Independence Day, show a slow-down in lumber sales. Normally by this time of year buyers have ordered — and indeed received — the vast bulk of the wood they will be needing for the season’s building projects, so demand is slowing down and prices are softening (Canadian Forest Industries)
'Massive corrective free fall': Lumber wipes out all its 2021 gains after record boom Prices have declined on rising inventory levels and a 'significant drop' in lumber demand at large retail stores (Financial Post)
Lumber Wipes Out 2021 Gain With Demand Ebbing After Record Boom Lumber, which at one point was among the world’s best-performing commodities as the pandemic sent construction demand soaring and stoked fears of inflation, has officially wiped out all of its staggering gains for the year. (Bloomberg)
In Investing, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff It is easy to obsess about the smallest parts of your portfolio, like the tiny amounts of interest spun off by money-market funds today. Don’t waste your time. (New York Times)
Monty Python and the Search for the Ultimate Index Why is MSCI seeking something that was proved not to exist back in 1977 and then declared dead in 1992? (Bloomberg)
On Chandler Bing’s Job Twenty-five years ago, Friends anticipated a time that would both romanticize and mistrust the culture of work. (The Atlantic)
Barry Diller Headed 2 Hollywood Studios. He Now Says The Movie Business Is Dead "The movie business is over," Diller said in an exclusive interview with NPR on the sidelines of the Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference, a media and technology conference in Idaho. "The movie business as before is finished and will never come back." (NPR)
The baby bust: How a declining birth rate will reshape the world We are now facing a demographic winter that will transform the way we live. (New Statesman)
The Dream of Florida Is Dead The Miami condo collapse is a crisis for the entire state. (Slate)