Deadline for CEBA loan repayment extended until December 31, 2023

The repayment deadline for CEBA loans to qualify for partial loan forgiveness is being extended from December 31, 2022, to December 31, 2023, for all eligible borrowers in good standing.

Repayment on or before the new deadline of December 31, 2023, will result in loan forgiveness of up to a third of the value of the loans (meaning up to $20,000).

Outstanding loans would subsequently convert to two-year term loans with interest of 5 per cent per annum commencing on January 1, 2024, with the loans fully due by December 31, 2025.

The government is also announcing that the repayment deadline to qualify for partial forgiveness for CEBA-equivalent lending through the Regional Relief and Recovery Fund is extended to December 31, 2023.

The GNCC had previously recommended to the Government of Canada that CEBA loan deadlines be extended as the pandemic has lasted longer than anticipated. This decision will help a lot of businesses and assist in our economic recovery.

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Vaccine clinic coming to Fleming Centre in Beamsville on January 16

A COVID-19 vaccine clinic will take place at the Fleming Centre in Beamsville to administer the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to eligible individuals 29 years of age and younger, and Moderna to eligible individuals 30 years and older, while supplies last. No appointment is required.

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No delivery yet scheduled for 80% of Ontario’s rapid tests

Federal Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos says Canada is in crisis when it comes to COVID-19 PCR testing capacity, even as the federal government struggles to make good on its promise to deliver 140 million rapid tests to provinces by the end of the month, the CBC reports.

Duclos says access to PCR tests in provinces is a crisis, and that’s why at-home rapid tests will be such an important tool to combat the Omicron wave of COVID-19.

But some provinces have flagged that shipments of those vital rapid tests from the federal government have been slow to arrive.

In Ontario, fewer than 0.3 per cent of the rapid tests committed to the province in January have been delivered so far, and there is no delivery scheduled for about 80 per cent of them.

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J.P. Morgan expects Bank of Canada to increase interest rate

Economists at J.P. Morgan expect the Bank of Canada will raise its benchmark interest rate at its Jan. 26 meeting, ahead of the central bank’s own timeline for liftoff, Bloomberg News reports.

“Based on rhetoric from the Bank of Canada in December, it was clear that labour market dynamics and outperforming economic data had created heightened concerns at the Bank that the output gap was closing more rapidly than expected,” wrote Silvana Dimino, a New York-based economist at J.P. Morgan, in a report to clients Tuesday.

Dimino sees the Bank raising its benchmark rate by 25 basis points to 0.5 per cent in January; her team previously called for the first move in April. She expects there will be five rate hikes this year, which would push the benchmark rate to 1.5 per cent by year-end.

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Reading Recommendations

Ottawa reviewing Quebec plan to tax unvaccinated

CTV News

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says “incentives and strong measures” have worked in the fight against COVID-19, weighing in on Quebec’s proposed tax on unvaccinated residents.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday during a pandemic update, Trudeau said Ottawa is reviewing Quebec’s plan to penalize those without a medical exemption with a financial levy “with interest” and is awaiting more details from the province.

“As we’ve said, incentives and strong measures, whether it’s vaccine passports, whether it’s requirements for travellers, whether it’s the requirement for public servants to be fully vaccinated, we have taken very strong measures in the past and they have worked in terms of keeping Canadians safe,” he said.

Luxury home sales soar by triple-digits, shattering records across Canada

Financial Post

Any home in Canada is expensive these days, but apparently that hasn’t dulled demand for the top tier of the market.

The pandemic stampede for homes and increasing confidence in the economy’s recovery had buyers snapping up properties that ran into the millions in 2021, depleting inventory and setting new sales and price records.

New data from Sotheby’s International Realty Canada out this morning show that luxury markets in Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal and Calgary all saw triple-digit increases in sales.

“Canada’s real estate market was redefined in 2021. There has been a transformative change in Canadians’ perceptions of the importance of their homes as an investment in lifestyle and pleasure, physical sanctuary and security, as well as financial stability and generational wealth,” said Don Kottick, president and CEO of Sotheby’s International Realty Canada.

Domestic demand was the main driver, helped along by low interest rates and record cash savings. Anxiety over whether the stock market would continue to gain also encouraged Canadians to diversify into real estate, said Kottick. However, the year did see a gradual increase in international interest in luxury properties.

U.S. inflation hits 39-year high of 7%, sets stage for Fed hike

Bloomberg News

U.S. consumer prices soared last year by the most in nearly four decades, illustrating red-hot inflation that sets the stage for the start of Federal Reserve interest-rate hikes as soon as March.

The consumer price index climbed 7 per cent in 2021, the largest 12-month gain since June 1982, according to Labor Department data released Wednesday. The widely followed inflation gauge rose 0.5 per cent from November, exceeding forecasts.