Canada

[kennynah]

bank of canada hikes key lending rate to 1%

[kennynah]

canadian new motor vehicle sales rose 2.4%

[winston]

I thought their economy is doing well. So it's not that hot after all ...

Canada Finance Minister Says Canada Deficit Will Be More Than C$50 Billion
By Gene Laverty

Canada’s budget deficit for the previous fiscal year will surpass C$50 billion ($48.5 billion), Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said today, in line with government projections for a record gap as the economy fell into recession.

Flaherty had projected in March that the deficit for the year ended March 31 would be C$53.8 billion, after the governing Conservatives implemented a stimulus package to bolster the economy and revenue fell as output contracted.

Faster-than-expected growth this year, coupled with stimulus measures that have begun to expire, suggests Flaherty may be able to lower the deficit even as he presses ahead with planned corporate tax cuts. The Canadian government forecast the deficit for the fiscal year that began in April will be C$49.2 billion.

The government said last month its deficit so far this year is “broadly consistent” with that projection.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government released a fiscal plan in March that eliminated tariffs for manufacturing imports and confirmed a schedule for corporate tax cuts that Canada says will give it the lowest tax rate in the Group of Seven.

The Conservatives have pledged to balance the budget within five years by controlling spending for defense, international aid and government operations.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-1 ... llion.html

[winston]

WHY CANADIAN STOCKS ARE SOARING RIGHT NOW

The message from today's chart: Soaring natural resource prices are heaven for some… and hell for others.

Today's chart shows the performance of the big Canadian investment fund (EWC, the black line) over the last six months, versus the performance of the big Indian investment fund (IFN, the blue line). As you can see, these two funds are heading in opposite directions…

Canada is the ultimate resource investment destination. It's home to the largest safe store of crude oil in the world… It's also blessed with incredible timber, gold, uranium, agriculture, and natural gas deposits.

It's a safe country. It's right next door to the resource-hungry U.S. When problems with other resource producers, like Libya, occur, it's bullish for Canada.

India, on the other hand, is like many other emerging markets… It must import much of its needed raw materials. So soaring oil and food prices suffocate its economy.

You can see the differing fortunes of these two nations below. The Canadian fund is up more than 25% in the past six months… and has surged in response to the violence in Libya. The Indian fund has lost several percent in the same time. When resource prices are robust and rising, Canada is the place to be.


www.dailywealth.com

[winston]

Canadian Government Falls, Election Set for May

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The opposition toppled Canada’s Conservative government on Friday, accusing it of sleaze and mismanagement, and set the scene for a May election that polls indicate the Conservatives will win.

Source: REUTERS US ONLINE

[winston]

Do you know what your tax dollars are being spent on ?
I'm surprised that they would want to go down to Quebec..

Quieter royal tour heads for mixed Quebec reception

OTTAWA (Reuters) - A visit to Canada by Britain's Prince William and Kate took on a quieter note on Saturday as the newlyweds prepared to head for Quebec and a politically sensitive phase of their royal tour.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge attended a tree-planting ceremony with invited guests in Ottawa and helped unveil a newly purchased mural at the Canadian War Memorial where they also greeted military veterans and war brides.

They are later heading to Montreal where they planned to visit a hospital neo-natal ward, then attend a cooking class before boarding a Canadian Navy frigate for an overnight trip down the St Lawrence River to Quebec City.

Saturday's schedule contrasted with the first two days of the nine-day Canadian tour that included events with thousands of people watching and often chanting "Will and Kate" at the potential future king and queen of Britain and Canada.

Anti-monarchist groups in Quebec have vowed to protest the visit by Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to the French-speaking province and security was expected to be even tighter than at events in Ottawa, Canada's capital.

Some recent tours by members of the Royal family have avoided Quebec, where many still see Britain's defeat of France in 1759 giving it sovereignty over Canada as a raw wound.

Supporters of the monarchy in Canada see the couple's first overseas tour since becoming married in April as an opportunity to reinvigorate public interest in the royal family.

William and Kate are touring seven cities in four provinces and one territory on their Canadian tour. They head to California on July 8.

A poll this week found almost half of Canadians believe that the nation should sever ties with the monarchy when Queen Elizabeth dies, although that was down 10 percentage points from a year ago.

Source: Reuters US Online Report Entertainment News

[kennynah]

It was reported that canadian tax payers are footing the CAD1.5mil to sponsor this couple's 8 dats tour of Canada

[winston]

And the politicians will probably say that they can get it back from tourism, as in some money losing sporting events etc.

How to argue when they throw 10,000 statistics at you and you have no means to verify whether their data is correct in the first place ?

And when you ask for more info, they will call you names like "stupid", "daft" etc ..

[winston]

Quebec separatists protest William and Kate visit by Michel Comte

A small but vocal group of anti-monarchists met Prince William and his wife Catherine in Quebec Saturday during their Canadian tour with chants of "Down with the monarchy!"

"We will never bend, Willy go home!" some 60 of protesters shouted outside a Montreal children's hospital the royal couple visited. "French Quebec!" and "Parasite go home!" they chanted.

The group pounded on buckets as the couple entered the hospital without acknowledging them, drowning out a much larger group of well-wishers, many of whom cried out "We love you Kate!"

More protests are expected on the royal couple's next stop in Quebec City on Sunday.

Britain conquered Quebec, a former French colony, in 1763, but its culture and language survived and today it is a bastion of French culture in North America.

British rule, however, still evokes resentment in some quarters of the Canadian province.

Saturday's demonstration was organized by a group whose stated objective is the defense of the French language in North America.

Its president, Mario Beaulieu, told AFP the duke and duchess's visit "raises the issue of francophone assimilation," as well as "the linguistic purging of Quebec, in which the Canadian government is complicit."

According to Beaulieu, the monarchy "is an obsolete institution, anti-democratic and sexist, and Quebec wants none of it."

A poll released on the eve of the duke and duchess's visit found that a third of Canadians want to cut ties with the British monarchy.

In Quebec, where 83 percent of the population speaks French and only 10 percent speak English, disaffection with the royals runs as high as 60 percent, according to the Angus Reid survey.

As a member of the Commonwealth, Canada's official head of state is the British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who is represented by a governor general.

Quebec twice rejected independence in referendums in 1980 and 1995, the last time by a narrow margin.

Separatists would like to hold a third vote, but recent infighting has marred their organization.

Prince William, second in line to the British throne, and his wife celebrated Canada Day among hundreds of thousands of adoring fans in Ottawa, with fireworks and musical performances on Friday.

The duchess of Cambridge smiled broadly and exchanged polite banter as she shook hands with the crowd for longer than the intended hour.

The Quebec leg of their trip, however, includes no major public events, apparently an attempt to reduce possible confrontations with anti-monarchists or separatists like the one that embarrassed William's father, Prince Charles, when he visited in 2009.

Quebec separatists clashed with riot police outside an army hall at the time, delaying the arrival of the prince of Wales.

Late Saturday, William and Kate were scheduled to take a cooking class at the Quebec Institute of Tourism and Hotel Business, then sail overnight aboard a navy frigate to Quebec City for a tour of the historic fortified quarter known as the Citadel.

The couple will also meet with members of the Royal 22nd Regiment, the most famous francophone unit in the Canadian Forces.

The Quebec nationalist group RRQ has called for a rude welcome in Quebec City for the couple.

William and Catherine are very likable, protest organizer Patrick Bourgeois told AFP, but are being used by Ottawa to give the world a false impression that Quebec's separatist movement has faded away and its members now accept being part of a Canadian federation dominated by Anglo-Saxons.

Earlier Saturday, the couple planted a ceremonial tree at the Ottawa residence of the governor general symbolizing their everlasting "love and marriage" and unveiled a massive painting at the Canadian War Museum.

From Montreal and Quebec City, they will move on to Charlottetown for rescue trials aboard a sea helicopter, to Yellowknife for aboriginal sports, and to Calgary for a rodeo.

Source: AFP American Edition

[winston]

Canada could deport China's most wanted man in days by Greg Joyce

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - China's most-wanted fugitive could be on a plane back home from Canada as early as Saturday unless a Canadian judge moves quickly to block his deportation, lawyers said on Thursday.

Federal Court Judge Michel Shore will decide on Thursday night or Friday morning whether to block the extradition of Lai Changxing, who says he does not believe Chinese assurances that he would not be tortured or executed if sent back.

Shore reserved judgment after several hours of arguments on whether it would be safe to extradite Lai, accused of running a multibillion-dollar smuggling operation in China in the 1990s.

China has told Canada in a diplomatic note that it would not put Lai to death or torture him, and that Canadian officials would have access to him.

"These are not adequate assurances. They don't amount to anything," Matas replied.

Lai fled to Canada with his family in 1999 and claimed refugee status, saying the allegations against him were politically motivated. Canada rejected his refugee claim, and he was taken into custody and nearly deported two weeks ago.

China says Lai bribed Chinese officials to avoid paying taxes and duties on goods ranging from fuel to cigarettes that were shipped into China's southeastern Fujian province.

Lai admitted in a 2009 interview with the Globe and Mail newspaper that he had avoided taxes by taking advantage of loopholes in the law, but he denied bribery charges. He said if he were not in Canada he would have been executed by now.

Matas said Lai's brother and his accountant had both died in prison of unexplained causes and that the same fate could await Lai.

"He too could die in prison without an autopsy and without any explanation. The assurances do not provide for an autopsy, or even a viewing of the corpse," Matas said in a written submission.

"The notion that criminal procedures or the death penalty are easily verifiable is misplaced. The death penalty and criminal procedure assurances suffer from the problem that the courts in China are not public."

Matas said China has only assured that when the court holds open hearings into his case, Canadian officials may attend. He quoted the U.S. State Department as saying that Chinese courts use state-secret provisions to keep politically sensitive proceedings closed to the public, to counsel and to foreign observers.

Source: Reuters US Online Report World News