Pension

• The real GDP growth forecast for 2024 is 0.7 per cent.
• While the Canadian economy is not growing as rapidly as the United States, he argued, few are.

• In our recent book, Fiscal Choices: Canada After the Pandemic, we explain why Canada’s anemic growth rate is worrying and why politicians and their advisors believe, almost unanimously, that economic growth is a policy imperative.
• Similarly, transfers to other governments — the Canada Health Transfer and Equalization payments, for example — are legal requirements.
• Reductions in spending or increases in taxes are austerity measures and austerity has so far produced limited, if any, payoffs in terms of economic growth.

Interest rates are outpacing growth rates

• When growth is strong and interest rates are low, debt is manageable.
• As long as the social rate of return from government spending is greater than the real interest rate, fiscal deficits help maintain output at potential.
• But right now, interest rates are higher than growth rates.
• At the time, interest payments on the debt consumed 7.04 per cent of the federal budget.
• In 2023, by contrast, the interest rate on bonds had climbed to 3.3 per cent and growth had declined to 1.1 per cent nationally.

Government review processes

• In the 2022 budget, the federal government announced a review of programs to realize savings in the order of $6 billion over five years.
• The 2023 budget and the 2023 Fall Economic Statement doubled down on this initiative, requiring savings in the order of $15.8 billion.
• With the exception of the review process undertaken by the federal government under Jean Chrétien in 1994, program reviews have yielded very little in long term savings.

Economic progress

• There is nothing wrong with reviewing our assumptions about what economic progress looks like and who benefits from a bigger economy.
• But we also need economic growth — not just so we can consume more, or generate more revenue for governments, but so we can take better care of one another.
• Improved productivity, in both the public and private sectors, is another way of saying more sustainable economic growth.

Michael M. Atkinson receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Haizhen Mou receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

• EBA, EIOPA and ECB set up a joint governance framework for the collaboration on the DPM 2.0 standard
  The European Banking Authority (EBA), the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) and the European Central Bank (ECB) set up a Data Point Model (DPM) alliance, establishing a common governance framework for the collaboration on the DPM 2.0 Standard.
• Following the publication by the EBA and EIOPA of the DPM 2.0 standard in June 2023, the two ESAs together with the ECB have agreed on the common arrangements that will govern their cooperation on DPM 2.0 (the DPM alliance).
• Under the DPM alliance, the EBA, EIOPA and ECB will together govern the DPM 2.0 standard and cooperate in the DPM methodology for modelling reporting requirements, the metamodel used for populating the reporting requirements and the associated documentation.
• The DPM alliance is established through a Memorandum of Understanding that was signed by the EBA, ECB, and EIOPA.

• IKB Deutsche Industriebank AG figures for the 2023 financial year: Solid figures achieved in a difficult environment
  The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement.
• IKB Deutsche Industriebank AG figures for the 2023 financial year: Solid figures achieved in a difficult environment
  Ample liquidity with free available liquidity reserve of €1.4 billion (previous year: €1.2 billion)
  Dr Michael Wiedmann, Chairman of the Board of Managing Directors of IKB: “We have met our annual targets and are on track to achieving our medium-term goals.
• 2023 was largely characterised by the increase in market interest rates against a difficult economic backdrop.
• Table: IKB income statement for the 2023 financial year (Group, in accordance with German commercial law)

• The full-range financial service offering, encompassing insurance and banking services, is proving extremely popular with customers and is continuing to grow steadily across Switzerland.
• Clemens Markstein, CEO of Baloise Switzerland: “The storm that hit all parts of Ticino in August resulted in an exceptionally high number of claims for the Switzerland business in 2023.
• But the business still proved robust despite it being such an exceptional year for claims.
• The very good growth in premiums in the non-life business was particularly encouraging, as were the strong earnings in the banking business.