Two Minutes to Midnight

4/23/2019

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Credit booms are followed by credit busts and as the chart shows, Canadian Residential Mortgage Credit (%Y/Y lending) has been shrinking dramatically since the July 2008 Crude Oil Peak and the Crash into the March 2009 Pit of Gloom (6 Metros Chart).

It's been 10 years since the 2008-09 crash which is difficult to even remember now after 10 years of watching our housing prices more than double. But as Hilliard Macbeth points out in the chart above, when residential mortgage lending momentum approaches and dips into a negative metric, housing prices tumble and recession metrics begin to appear. In the two biggest FOMO markets, Vancouver and Toronto, prices indeed have been dropping in the 7-9% per year range after peaking 18-20 months ago respectively (Plunge-O-Meter).

As Hilliard further points out:

"There hasn’t been a serious economic downturn in Canada since the 1990s; the last time that mortgage credit grew as slowly as now. Unfortunately bank lending is pro-cyclical, so lenders will tighten credit conditions just as real estate borrowing stops growing, which will make the downturn worse. This boom/bust cycle is inevitable as long as lenders focus on lending for real estate investment and speculation rather than more productive investments. To change that focus, a new set of rules and regulations that govern lending is needed.” Quote included in Jason Kirby and MACLEAN's Most Important Charts to Watch in 2019

Canadian Banks on "Credit Doomsday Watch" CIBC

The CIBC analysts said that Canadian banks appear to be headed for their weakest credit cycle since the oil price collapse, which caused related loan losses to jump in 2016. While their prediction is “not a coming apocalypse,” the report said the banks’ loan losses last quarter had a “one-off feel to them” that could become more frequent. “For reference, the actual doomsday clock sits at two minutes to midnight,” the analysts said.

Well it could easily be one o'clock in the morning as weak hands cut their losses. Hat Tip to @Hutchyman

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It's important to remember that our housing and credit boom is part of the global credit boom and it's fading. Hat Tip to @TaviCosta

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