Western Standard - July 14, 2022


Andrew Ruhland on the interest rates hike


Episode Stats


Length

9 minutes

Words per minute

180.24754

Word count

1,631

Sentence count

96

Harmful content

Hate speech

2

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Corey and Andrew discuss the Bank of Canada's interest rate hike, the impact on the housing market, and the implications for the rest of the economy. They also discuss the impact of higher interest rates on the Canadian housing market.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey, Andrew, how are you doing?
00:00:01.280 I'm well, good morning, Corey.
00:00:03.200 Great, thanks for coming in today,
00:00:05.280 or at least coming on today, I should say.
00:00:06.720 Usually you come in person, but this was sort of sudden
00:00:09.040 because we knew the interest rates were gonna be coming up,
00:00:11.760 but I think the size of this hike
00:00:14.640 and how recently since the last one
00:00:17.120 that came out of the Bank of Canada,
00:00:19.040 I think it's caught still some people flat-footed
00:00:21.120 and has really sort of given a bit of a slap to the head.
00:00:24.920 Yeah, nobody is more flat-footed actually
00:00:26.800 than the central bankers.
00:00:28.360 You know, they basically were laid out of the gate,
00:00:32.400 probably at least a year behind
00:00:33.960 in terms of starting the interest rate hiking cycle,
00:00:37.720 you know, just based on monetary policy
00:00:41.320 with so much money printing.
00:00:42.840 And so what we saw today from Tip Mathlin,
00:00:47.040 you know, governor of the Bank of Canada,
00:00:48.920 is basically central bankers panicking because,
00:00:53.600 and it's, I wanna be really clear about this.
00:00:56.280 It's not because increasing interest rates
00:00:59.640 at the central bank level
00:01:01.240 is going to actually do much of anything
00:01:04.720 to actually stop the price inflation that we have,
00:01:08.880 but it's political because they've been forced into it
00:01:11.920 by virtue of being kind of a political entity,
00:01:16.560 in addition to being obviously
00:01:18.640 an economic and monetary entity.
00:01:20.840 And, you know, the reason why the interest rates are not,
00:01:24.480 interest rate increases are not going to have
00:01:26.480 the price dampening effect that a lot of people think
00:01:30.080 that they will, is because this is not,
00:01:33.200 the price inflation that we're experiencing
00:01:35.480 is not being driven by a robust economy
00:01:38.880 with tons and tons of demand.
00:01:41.200 This is being driven by supply shortfall.
00:01:44.280 And supply shortfall is a direct result of shorter term
00:01:47.880 and longer term policy decisions at the government level,
00:01:52.480 not necessarily the Bank of Canada level.
00:01:54.360 So.
00:01:55.760 And that's pretty distressing to think
00:01:57.440 because one thing that raising the interest rates
00:01:59.400 will do though, was it will chill the economy.
00:02:01.720 I mean, that's sort of the intent
00:02:03.000 if you're thinking you're fighting inflation.
00:02:05.840 I mean, capital projects get deferred
00:02:07.880 or at least scaled back.
00:02:09.360 People are less inclined to purchase houses
00:02:11.520 or do business starts if they have to finance.
00:02:13.760 I guess these, these rates are gonna have an impact on us.
00:02:16.640 And then we start fearing a recession.
00:02:18.360 It will have an economic impact unquestionably,
00:02:21.240 but it's not gonna do anything for price inflation
00:02:23.720 other than perhaps in, in the housing market.
00:02:26.600 And most, especially in the, you know, the three,
00:02:30.120 the three highest price local housing markets,
00:02:34.840 which would be the greater Toronto area,
00:02:37.240 the lower mainland and Vancouver Island.
00:02:39.520 And those are the areas where the prices have, have,
00:02:42.200 you know, been ridiculous for, for quite some time.
00:02:45.400 But the fact is, is that, you know,
00:02:47.080 they have a certain amount of limitations on supply,
00:02:49.920 especially west of us,
00:02:52.320 but also driven substantially by having a lot of demand
00:02:55.480 from, from net in migration.
00:02:57.840 And, and so those are the areas that are gonna have to see
00:03:01.560 the, the biggest price adjustments downward,
00:03:04.640 because the, the market always finds a certain equilibrium
00:03:09.000 of, of, of price and, and, and volume, right?
00:03:13.280 It's based on supply and demand.
00:03:15.000 And so when the cost of financing a home goes up
00:03:20.200 and people's wages don't go up as quickly
00:03:23.120 as, as interest rates go up and the mortgage payments go up,
00:03:26.760 the price of the asset, in this case, the home,
00:03:29.440 has to come down so that the payment meets the ability of the buyer to pay.
00:03:33.800 So we're kind of getting the, the worst of both out of this.
00:03:38.080 Then we're going to get the chilled economy,
00:03:39.800 the pressure on us as individuals,
00:03:41.960 but we aren't going to get the reduction in,
00:03:43.880 in cost of goods and services.
00:03:45.680 And, and it sounds like the bank can,
00:03:48.040 is signaling that they're going to carry on and, and increase these,
00:03:50.360 these rates more in the coming future.
00:03:51.720 Yeah. We ain't seen nothing yet is, is my view.
00:03:54.920 They're just getting started.
00:03:56.080 And I would characterize this as being, you know,
00:04:00.920 all kinds of pain for very little gain in terms of intended result.
00:04:05.560 The problems with the supply chain are mostly policy driven, as I mentioned.
00:04:12.640 Now, so supply chains always are at risk of exogenous events,
00:04:16.240 such as natural disasters, as an example, right?
00:04:19.560 I mean, if you have a hurricane that's going to close a port,
00:04:22.600 if you have an earthquake that might close a port and damage the rail lines
00:04:26.360 and highways and, and, and all those kinds of things.
00:04:28.920 So supply chains don't need policy decisions that, that are hurting.
00:04:35.720 Right. And when I, when I say policy decisions,
00:04:38.760 I'm talking about on the supply side, particularly with, with oil and gas.
00:04:43.880 But since the beginning of the, of the, the Russian invasion of Ukraine,
00:04:48.760 basically all of almost all of the economic pain has been borne by Western countries
00:04:55.560 because the, the leaders of the Western countries said, well, you know, we don't want to,
00:05:00.920 we don't want to get into a direct shooting war with Russia.
00:05:04.040 We'll fight to the last Ukrainian and give them lots of arms, 1.00
00:05:07.080 but we don't want to get in a direct shooting war with them.
00:05:09.960 So we'll try and punish them with economic sanctions.
00:05:12.600 Well, those economic sanctions are effectively a giant economic boomerang
00:05:16.520 and they've come back and they have smacked the Western nations in, in, in the face. 0.61
00:05:21.240 Well, I mean, I guess, you know, there's a lot to watch and a lot changing, you know,
00:05:26.360 quickly, I guess, before I let you get back to work, like for those of us,
00:05:29.880 people of course are worried about their investments, their nest eggs.
00:05:33.560 How do you hedge against what looks to be coming here?
00:05:35.880 You know, I mean, our bonds going to start looking a little better if we're getting higher interest
00:05:39.400 rates or should we just be leaving our portfolios alone or what do we do to ride this out?
00:05:44.280 Okay.
00:05:45.560 That's an hour long discussion, but I'll be as brief as I can.
00:05:49.240 You guys specialize in it.
00:05:50.520 And I know there's a lot more on your website to cover, but.
00:05:53.080 Right. Rising interest rates are going to hurt bonds.
00:05:56.280 Now, if you're buying bonds fresh, you'll get a higher yield, which is great.
00:06:00.840 There may at some point in the future be some room for capital gains if they
00:06:05.080 have to drop interest rates again, you know, if we get another economic blow.
00:06:09.720 But for the the major trend is upwards in inflation and interest rates.
00:06:15.080 So the fact is, is that traditional bonds are actually a very unsafe asset class going forward.
00:06:21.000 The stock markets, commodity markets, bond markets, they are all discounting mechanisms.
00:06:27.960 They look out into the future and they price in what they think is going to happen.
00:06:31.880 They usually overshoot both on the upside and the downside.
00:06:35.960 In this case, they priced in a recession and that recession is being driven by by demand
00:06:44.440 destruction from high oil and gas prices.
00:06:47.800 So it's going to take and, you know, fertilizer, natural gas, all those things that we know
00:06:53.080 are our problem.
00:06:54.360 So in terms of what to do in a portfolio, I would say the worst thing to do right now
00:06:59.960 would be to react and turn temporary declines into permanent losses.
00:07:03.560 But that doesn't mean you should be oblivious or or passive.
00:07:09.320 Start looking for new ways to to actually profit from inflation.
00:07:14.040 And it takes time for for stock markets and commodity markets to to adjust.
00:07:18.280 But I think that most of the pain is already in.
00:07:20.280 At least I hope so.
00:07:21.720 But longer term companies raise their dividends.
00:07:25.400 Great companies raise their dividends faster than the rate of inflation, which drives their
00:07:29.240 stock prices back up.
00:07:30.920 And if they're selling a commodity with a long term upward trend, they will also benefit.
00:07:35.400 Great.
00:07:36.360 Well, the most important and first part advice, of course, was, yeah, don't panic.
00:07:39.560 Just just, you know, work with things with a plan and so on.
00:07:42.920 And that's just where I wanted to lead you.
00:07:44.200 Because, yeah, I know in our quick 10 minutes here, we won't have time to cover it all.
00:07:47.800 But that's your specialty.
00:07:49.080 I mean, you hold entire webinars and things such as that to help people with all those sorts of
00:07:53.320 things.
00:07:53.640 So maybe, you know, before I let you go, then where can people find more information?
00:07:57.320 Because a lot of people are worried and concerned.
00:07:58.920 I mean, they've been saving their retirements looming or maybe they're already retired.
00:08:02.600 They want to make sure that they can weather this storm.
00:08:04.920 Well, as you can see by the by the backdrop, we're integrated wealth management and you can type
00:08:10.680 in integratedwealthmanagement.ca.
00:08:13.560 And we also have a new web domain.
00:08:15.400 It's i-wealth.ca.
00:08:18.360 So integratedwealthmanagement.ca or i-wealth.ca.
00:08:23.480 Great.
00:08:23.800 Well, thanks for coming to, you know, explain a little bit what's going on with this.
00:08:27.240 As you know, it's important to know those differences.
00:08:29.880 For example, as you said, there's different types of things pushing inflation.
00:08:32.520 If it was a red hot economy, that's one thing, because at least that means things are moving.
00:08:37.000 But if it's supply chain, then you really got to be careful with that economy,
00:08:40.520 because you cool that down, we're going to make a lot of trouble.
00:08:42.840 Yep.
00:08:43.160 This is cost push, not demand pull.
00:08:46.360 All right.
00:08:46.840 Well, thanks.
00:08:47.400 Maybe we'll check in as things develop down the road here.
00:08:49.720 And I appreciate your input today, Andrew.
00:08:52.360 My pleasure.
00:08:52.920 Have a good day.