New inflation values out today - be careful how you interpret this!

     

    TL;DR: When StatsCan measures changes in prices, they do so for a fixed basket of goods - this includes maintaining quality at a fixed level. When the quality of goods increases over time this creates problems - especially when consumers cannot choose to still purchase the lower quality good for a cheaper price - the result is that the actual inflation of this good, likely, is significantly more than the posted rate of inflation.     

    A common argument is that the average household today is better off than John D Rockefeller because we now have access to microwaves and the internet. Thus, this drastic increase in the quality and availability of new goods must mean that we live significantly better lives. The real question is, can we honestly compare the standard of living across such an expanse of time given drastically different goods, and the quality of goods available. 

    Just the same, an attempt at this adjustment is used in calculating the Consumer Price Index (CPI). recognizing that we have access to superior quality goods today Vs what we had 10, 20, or 30 years ago. This improvement in quality must be accounted for in computing the change in the price of a fixed basket of goods. 

    I talk about this a lot with my students - CPI inflation is intended to be a measure of the change in aggregate consumer price levels for a fixed basket of goods to provide information to policymakers regarding how consumer prices have changed year over year. This provides insight as to what has been happening with prices, but it is not the full story and it is not a good measure of the cost of living.

    But first, why is this problematic? This is problematic as the CPI measure of inflation is often used by employers, pensions, unions, and others to determine the change in the cost of living. This leads to the thinking "Oh, CPI inflation was 2% last year, so as long as I get a 2% pay raise I am no worse off". Unfortunately, as we will see - this may not be true. Specifically, your observed rate of inflation may be significantly higher than the reported CPI inflation - basically, the problem comes down to assumed substitutability.

    (This helps to explain why even though wage growth has been slightly higher than CPI inflation, the average wage earner today feels as if their purchasing power is less than it used to be)

    To evaluate this, let's focus on the aspect of CPI inflation, rented accommodation - while shelter costs on whole are weighted as 26.8% of the CPI basket of goods, rented accommodation accounts for only 6.4% of the total CPI weighting (because we assume that most households are owners - however, a similar problem exists for owned accommodation as the problem we discuss here).

    To begin, we can look at the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) historical records showing the median rental price in the Capital Regional District (CRD) from October 2011 through to October 2021 (the latest available published data), this shows that average rental prices have increased by 4.97% on average over the last ten years (source).

    To compare this to the latest CPI inflation information, we see that over the last ten years the rental accommodation aspect of CPI inflation for the CRD has only increased by an average of 1.92% (source).

    So on one hand, we have the CMHC saying that rents have increased by 4.97% annually (on average), while we have Statistics Canada through the CPI saying that rents have only increased by 1.92% annually. Where does this large discrepancy come from? 

    While these two values are computed through different surveys, and over slightly different time periods, it is easy to presume that as both surveys sample from the same population, we should have approximately the same values given the large sample size - that is to say, sampling error does not explain this difference. 

    What does then? Partly it is in how Statistics Canada and all OECD countries compute the CPI. By definition, the CPI is measuring the change in the price of a fixed basket of goods. For some goods, this is not problematic. IE. The price of a litre of milk in 2011 was $X, then in 2021 the price of litre of milk is now $Y - in this case, milk is milk and has not significantly changed over the last ten years.

    But what about when measuring expenditure on other items? Cars, Computers, Cell Phones, Housing? All of these goods have had quality increases over the last decade (a 2021 computer is not the same as a 2011 computer!) As a result, Stats Canada needs to recognize that quality has increased, and thus needs to determine what would be the change in price for a constant quality (fixed basket) rather than the change in price due to the fact that it is a fundamentally new good being sold (again, it would be tough to argue that a 2021 computer is the same good as a 2011 computer). 

    Statistics Canada does this by using a matched-model method to measure pure price changes. That is, attempting to determine what the price of a good would be if we could somehow keep the quality constant.

    While the idea behind this fundamentally makes sense and is necessary - there are some major problems. Often as quality increases, the consumer no longer has the option to obtain the cheaper, original-quality option. For example, as cell phone speed, and features drastically increase each year, you are stuck paying for these features even if you do not want/need them because there are few if any phones on the market that do not include these new improved features. The same can be said for housing or vehicles. In fact, if features (quality) increase substantially while price only increases marginally, this matched-model method may actually report that the price for this good has decreased from year to year! 

    This becomes exceptionally problematic if the consumer does not actually differentiate based on quality. With respect to housing, what if the consumer is primarily concerned with access to shelter rather than access to different qualities of shelter. 

    If this is the case, then shelter becomes homogenous irrespective of quality - That is to say that the potential consumer does not significantly see a difference between low-quality shelter and high-quality shelter. Given the current tightness of the rental (and housing) market, this makes sense - and we would expect to witness similar market prices irrespective of quality. 

    If we take the year built to be a proxy of quality (IE, newer built homes have newer better quality features) we could test this hypothesis by comparing the two possible outcomes:

1. If we witness little if any price difference based on year built, then the consumer primarily cares about the availability of shelter, irrespective of quality. 
2. If we witness newer places renting for higher amounts, then consumers value quality and thus are willing to pay a premium to access higher quality shelter. (If this is the case, then we should be accounting for this change in quality when computing inflation!)

    Likely, we will witness a bit of both happening, so the real question is where are we sitting today Vs. where were we sitting in the past? Well, we find the following (Source)

    How do we interpret the above table? Initially, we find a large spread between old builds and new builds, this would signify that in 2011, there is a desire for quality - renters were willing to pay more for a quality (newer) unit over a lower quality (older) unit. 

    As we move forward to today (2021) we witness that this spread has flattened out. in 2011 the maximum rental price was 43% higher than the minimum, while in 2021 the maximum was only 9.7% higher.  

    This is signifying that renters are caring less about quality than they care about access to units, thus resulting in a reduction in the quality premium. That is to say, while StatsCan, through the CPI, still discounts higher rents to account for increased quality - the renters are not caring about the quality so much as they are caring about access to shelter.

    To summarize, CPI Inflation says that the cost of rental accommodation has only increased by 1.97%  Vs CMHC's reported 4.97%. The reason for the significantly lower CPI inflation increase is due to the fact that there has (on average) been an increase in the quality of rented accommodation. To account for this increase in quality, the price increase must take the quality increase into account in order to compare "apples to apples". This "apples to apples" comparison yields only a 1.97% increase in rental prices over the last ten years. 

    While this method of comparison is preferred to compute changes in prices from an economic and policymaker standpoint, this is problematic when these same metrics are used to compute changes in the cost of living as they will often under-estimate the true change in cost - this is especially true when the consumer does not have the option (or ability) to continue to choose the lower (original) quality option. 

    The crux of the argument is to use caution when interpreting CPI inflation as there are many assumptions that go into these calculations, and the recently reported annual inflation rate of 6.7% (source) may not be telling you what you think it is. 

    Any comments or questions please feel free to message me or comment below.

    

    

     

What does rising interest rates mean for homeowners?

 

    While I found it surprising that the Bank of Canada decided to keep rates steady yesterday (Jan 26th 22), especially in light of sustained inflation above their mandated target. 

    That being said, I also recognize that the Bank of Canada is between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, they have their mandate to maintain inflation between 1 and 3% (targeting 2%). On the other hand, Canadians have been amassing serious levels of debt, with some of the latest estimates pegging Canadian debt to disposable income at just over 177%.

    That is, Canadians tend to owe $1.77 for every dollar of income they earn -- but why does this cause trouble for the Bank of Canada?

    Well, as the Bank of Canada increases the overnight rate to combat inflation, this will also increase debt servicing costs for many Canadians, increasing the proportion of their income that goes towards interest costs. Depending on how rapidly the Bank of Canada acts - this could push certain Canadians into insolvency 

    According to an Ipsos survey from 2019, almost half of Canadians are $200 or less away from insolvency. One can imagine that since the pandemic, and increasing prices all around, this outlook has not improved. 

    Now, with the picture painted that Canadians are heavily indebted, with many on the verge of financial ruin - let's look at the housing market - That is, if the Bank of Canada were to increase interest rates, what impact will this have on the mortgage payments being made by Canadians? 

    First, important to differentiate between variable and fixed-rate mortgages. 

    Variable-rate mortgages are linked - somewhat - to the Bank of Canada's overnight rate. Speaking in generalities, if the Bank of Canada increases the overnight rate by 25 bps, then the variable rate mortgage also increases by 25bps -- meaning the debtor's payment will have to increase.

    Fixed-rate mortgages are a little different - with a fixed rate, the debtor is locked into a given rate for a certain term (say 5 years). With this arrangement, the debtor's payments are constant over the term of the mortgage but will be re-negotiated upon renewal (typically every 5 years).  That is, an increase in interest rates today will have no impact on the holder of a fixed-rate mortgage - until renewal.

    That is to say, a change in the overnight rate will impact variable rate holders immediately, but will impact fixed-rate holders over time - as they renew at new, potentially, higher rates.

    So let's see what the impact on monthly mortgage payments would be if we received a 100bps increase in interest rates (a conservative forecast).

    To do so, let's begin by determining the monthly payment on mortgages of various amounts if the current mortgage rate is 2.5% (a typical fixed-rate amount). 

    While not interesting on its own, let's re-work out what the monthly payment would be at a rate of 3.5%

    Here we see an increase in monthly payments, but what is the magnitude change in monthly payments?

    Thus we see that an increase of interest rates (from emergency lows) by 100bps, which still leaves at historic lows, causes drastic increases in the monthly mortgage payment for many Canadians. 

    Given, as we saw, that many Canadians are within $200 of insolvency we can now see why the Bank of Canada may be so hesitant to begin rapidly increasing interest rates. Even with this - this is just looking at the impact on mortgage payments, many will also be witnessing a potential increase in car loans, student loans, line of credit, etc. All together causing potential trouble for many Canadians.

    Of course - all this assumes that these payments (and prices) are rising, but incomes are staying constant - Of course, this is not true, as we witness inflation, there should also be increased pressure for wages to rise offsetting some of this pain - Although, we just showed a 100 bps increase in the lending rate would cause an 11.5% increase in monthly payments, unlikely that incomes will increase that much.

    Feel free to comment below with your thoughts 

The Impact of Changing House Prices on GDP in BC

Source: https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/markets-by-sector/real_estate/real-estate-in-decline/

Yesterday (11th of July 2018) the Bank of Canada continued to increase interest rates, as many expected. 

Since the increase in the interest rate, the media coverage has been flooded with conversation around the impact this will have on homeowners. Specifically, it is well presented that Canadian households currently have a pile of debt and will have trouble continuing to service their debt if their payments or obligations increased. you can read a Bank of Canada article on the subject here.

Building off of these discussions, although quite separate, I began to wonder. Here in BC the Finance, Insurance and Real Estate (FIRE) industry make up essentially 25% of our provincial GDP.

As governments continue to engage in policies which aim to make housing more affordable (decrease or slow price growth) and as the Bank of Canada continues its upward movement of interest rates (decreasing the demand and supply of real estate); we have some serious headwinds on house price growth. The question of interest then: Given the size of the FIRE industry in BC, for some change in the house price, how does this filter through to impact our provincial level of output?

To answer this I conducted a simple time-series analysis which allowed me to jointly model both house prices (Teranet national bank composite house price index for BC) as well as the provincial GDP (Statistics Canada).

In order to ensure stationarity, these variables have a log-difference transformation applied to them, giving them the interpretation of the annual percent change. Each can be viewed independently below:

With these variables, I then apply a one standard deviation shock to the transformed House Price Index (HPI), which works out to be about a 4.6% point annual change in the index. Observing how this shock filters itself through both the HPI and GDP over time we see the impact of this shock. This impact is presented below.

First, evaluating the impact of a 4.6 percentage point shock to the House Price Index (HPI) on itself. What we witness is no big surprise, the housing price index jumps in the shocked year (year 1) and then slowly returns to it's normal. With a 95% Confidence level, this shock to house prices has been fully absorbed within 2 and a half years.

Recall we are dealing with growth rates here. Imagine the HPI is doing its thing, then, out of the blue, it jumps by 4.6 percentage points. the effect is an immediate increase in the index, followed by 2 and a half years of additional (but slowing) growth before returning to its pre-shock level of growth. 

Looking at the impact of a shock to the HPI on GDP we witness an impact which was expected. Our shock happens in year one, however, this does not filter through to impact our level of GDP until the second year. At this point, the GDP jumps to an estimated increase of 2 percentage points (fairly large given average growth rates of GDP). However, this impact quickly subsides and is showing no statistical effect 2 and a half years after the shock.

Through this, we can determine the elasticity of GDP to the HPI (for some % change in HPI, what is the impact on the % change in GDP). Thus we can determine the elasticity of GDP to be 0.435, meaning that GDP is not overly sensitive to a change in the HPI, that is GDP would be inelastic. Just the same we can take this to mean that for a 1% point change in the HPI, we would expect to witness a 0.435% point change in the GDP.

So, if we do see a collapse of house prices, this may filter into a bad few years for the BC Economy. Keep in mind, in 2014 when oil prices collapsed causing Alberta's GDP to collapse, Oil and Gas (with support services) accounted for aproximately 8% of Alberta's GDP. Given BC's reliance on the FIRE industry (25% of GDP), a collapse in the price of real estate could very well have a major impact on our provincial economy.

What are your thoughts on this, feel free to comment below.

Rate Increase

Source: http://eldercarebroker.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/rateincrease.jpg

Old news by now, but if not aware, Bank of Canada increased the overnight rate by 25 basis points from a rate of 1.00% to 1.25%

I posted briefly about this as well as a link to an article by Don Pittis at the CBC outlining the headwinds the Canadian economy is facing.

Although I never commented ahead of time as to what I predicted would happen, I will say I was pleasantly surprised by the rate hike.

That is, my thought (with nothing but anecdotal evidence to support) was that interest rates would remain at 1.00% for the time being. The rationale for this was:

• There is a lot of uncertainty regarding the future of NAFTA, if this is at risk of being canceled, this could be a serious negative shock to Canada's Economy.
• Increase in the minimum wage may have a similar impact (however also may cause cost-push inflation).

On top of these two headwinds, we also have the effect that increasing interest rates have on consumption, and thus output. That is, an increasing interest rate acts as a negative shock to consumption, and thus to aggregate demand. Keep in mind, this is the big reason why the BoC wants to increase interest rates, as this effect cools inflationary pressures.

This is also the rationale I have when I state that I was pleasantly surprised by the interest rate hike. As we have watched Canadian debt levels explode over the last few years, it seems that an increase in interest rates is required to cool this growth in debt. 

What are your thoughts on the interest rate hike, with another expected 3 hikes this year, is this too much too fast or just what we need?

feel free to comment below.