BoC: Broadly expected to stay on hold - ING

 The Bank of Canada meet today with the central bank broadly expected to stay on hold (only 2 out of 23 economists surveyed by Bloomberg are looking for a ‘surprise’ hike), suggests Viraj Patel, Research Analyst at ING.

Key Quotes

“The more applicable question is whether Governor Poloz signals sufficient confidence over the economic outlook – as well as hopes for a NAFTA deal – such that investors raise their odds of a May BoC rate hike (currently 46% probability priced in). We’ll need a fairly explicit hawkish signal from the BoC to trigger any material CAD gains – though with NAFTA talks, higher oil prices and lower risk aversion all turning into tailwinds for the currency, we still think that the balance of risks are titled towards $/CAD drifting back down to 1.2400/50.”