Briefing highlights
- Canadian travellers shun U.S.
- Americans head north in greater numbers
- CIBC boosts dividend as profit climbs
- Loblaw profit rises 57%
- Glencore sees profit rebound
No, not because of him
It’s still our top destination, but Canadian travellers are shunning the United States in greater numbers.
Well, sure, I might want to stay out of the U.S. now, too, but more importantly for tourists is the fact that the 76-cent Canadian dollar buys that much less.
Travellers to the United States declined in 2016 for the third straight year, by 7.7 per cent to 41 million trips, according to numbers released this week by Statistics Canada.
“The decrease in 2016 was mainly attributable to a 9-per-cent reduction in the number of Canadian car trips to the United States, while air travel by Canadian residents to the United States declined 1.9 per cent,” the federal statistics agency added.
“Since 2013, when the Canadian dollar was last at par with the U.S. dollar, the number of Canadians travelling to the United States by car has fallen by 31.3 per cent, from 46.4 million in 2013 to 31.8 million in 2016.”
Americans, in turn, are visiting their northern neighbour even more, accounting for four of every five travellers to Canada.
Well, sure, I might want to get out of the U.S. now, too, but there’s also the fact that American tourists are getting tremendous bargains when they convert their money.
“With the United States experiencing the combination of a healthy economy and a strong dollar, the number of U.S. travellers to Canada rose 8.3 per cent from 2015 to 23.9 million in 2016,” the agency said.
“The gain in 2016 was similar to the 8.4-per-cent increase of the previous year, but in contrast to the declines or small increases in the numbers of U.S. travellers that characterized the preceding 15 years.”
As for elsewhere, as the old song suggests, we love Paris in the springtime. Parisians, in turn, seem to love Canada, too.
The new statistics show that French visitors represented the second-largest group of European travellers to Canada last year, behind the British.
They did in 2015, too, but their numbers swelled by almost 9 per cent in 2016 to 552,000, according to Statistics Canada.
Germans were third, up 11.1 per cent to 382,000.
At more than 30 million, the number of all foreign travellers to Canada in 2016 hit its highest since the 2008-2009 recession.
We also had a record number of overseas visitors, up 13.6 per cent from 2015.
“This was the seventh consecutive annual increase and the strongest annual gain since 2004, when overseas travel to Canada was recovering from the impact of the SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) outbreak of 2003,” the agency said.
When you put it all together, Canada still has a travel deficit, but one that’s shrinking, said National Bank senior economist Krishen Rangasamy.
“The improvement in the travel deficit coincides with the Canadian dollar’s depreciation, the latter no doubt discouraging Canadians from travelling abroad while making it cheaper for international travellers to visit Canada,” Mr. Rangasamy said “Last year’s tourism boom was felt in all of the four large provinces, each seeing higher inbound travels and lower outbound travels compared to the prior year,” he added.
So, while the benefits of a cheaper loonie may not be immediately apparent in merchandise trade (real exports barely grew last year), they are quite clear in the tourism sector.”
CIBC boosts dividend
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce kicked off the first-quarter results of the country’s big banks with a three-cent dividend hike.
The dividend rises to $1.27, CIBC said as it posted a stronger profit of $1.4-billion, or $3.50 a share, compared to $982-million or $2.43 a year earlier.
“In the first quarter, CIBC delivered strong performance across retail and business banking, wealth management and capital markets,” said chief executive officer Victor Dodig.
Earnings pour in
Other earnings are also pouring in.