The good news, the outlook for domestic and foreign sales remains strong. This is especially true for firms providing hard-to-distance services. These businesses expect to benefit from an easing of some COVID‑19 restrictions and the release of pent-up demand. Business sentiment remains high, most firms continue to anticipate healthy growth in both domestic and foreign demand, and in order to meet these demands, management plan to increase their capital expenditures and staffing levels over the next year. Businesses tied to housing, consumer goods and the government sector, areas that have led the recovery, continue to have a positive outlook. While most expect sales to continue to increase, firms that experienced record sales during the pandemic anticipate some deceleration. Still positive news, a rosy outlook with a slight downward bias.
The bad news, most firms are facing capacity limitations, their increase in sales have been held in check by two large problems, labour shortages and supply disruptions. Although, they would seem to go hand in hand, no labour, no supply, it is the supply disruptions that are impacting even the most mundane of consumer purchasing, toilet paper, toothpaste, and basic food items. Those items that do arrive, are now a lot more expensive due to demand and shipping costs, companies have said that they will pass on these costs directly which is causing inflation to ramp to its highest level in over a decade. Central banks claim that this is a short term blip, but once the price of goods goes up, they rarely fall back.
The Canadian dollar is slightly positive to the USD, equity markets continue to react favourably to Q3 earnings results, expect a narrow range with a positive sentiment.
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