Ottawa deepens ties to Shopify with new small retailer support program during pandemic: The program, called Go Digital Canada, aims to help entrepreneurs sell their wares online while physical retail store sales remain slow due to COVID-19 precautions. (Josh O’Kane and Sean Silcoff)
Bank of Canada sees economy shrinking 7.8% this year; holds rates steady: The forecast, the central bank’s first in six months, came as the bank announced its latest policy decision, holding its key interest rate steady at a record-low 0.25 per cent and leaving its large-scale bond-purchase programs unchanged. (David Parkinson)
U.K.-based real estate brokerage firm Purplebricks pulls out of Canada, sells operations to Desjardins: Desjardins Group is buying discount real estate brokerage Purplebricks Canada for $60.5-million, as the company’s British-based owner pulls out of Canada after failing to gain traction with an ambitious international expansion plan. (James Bradshaw)
Canadian dollar rallies as BoC forgoes adding to quantitative easing: The Canadian dollar strengthened to a six-day high against the greenback on Wednesday as investors grew more optimistic about a COVID-19 vaccine and the Bank of Canada decided against increasing the pace of its bond purchases. (Reuters)
Bank of Japan cautiously upbeat on recovery, signals policy pause: The Bank of Japan signalled confidence the economy will emerge from the coronavirus pandemic’s devastating blow and ruled out the risk of deflation, suggesting a pause in monetary easing after it delivered stimulus twice so far this year. (Reuters)
EU watchdog to review Germany’s financial reporting setup after Wirecard: The assessment by the European Securities and Markets Authority will focus on Germany’s financial supervisor BaFin and the accounting watchdog – the privately owned Financial Reporting Enforcement Panel. (Reuters)
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
RBC returns money to customers after discovering long-running foreign exchange error: Royal Bank of Canada is refunding money to nearly 60,000 personal banking clients after finding an error in the way it calculated some foreign exchange transactions for more than a decade. (James Bradshaw)
The Streetwise newsletter is Monday to Friday. If you’re reading this on the web, or if someone forwarded this e-mail to you, you can sign up for Streetwise and all Globe newsletters on our signup page.