Monthly credit aggregates, March 2021
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Released: 2021-05-20
Household mortgage borrowing jumps
Household sector borrowing is divided into financing in the form of non-mortgage loans, or funds principally for consumption, and mortgage loans, or debt acquired to finance the purchase of a property.
By the end of March, household mortgage debt had grown by $12.9 billion from the prior month. This was a marked return to the significant pace of borrowing recorded during the last half of 2020, as households recorded an increase in their mortgage debt of 7.4% compared with March of 2020. Similarly, sales of existing homes were robust in March, with overall sales volumes up nearly 76.1% from the same month in 2020 and the average selling price exceeding $700,000 for the first time.
Non-mortgage debt rose slightly in March, but was down 0.9% compared with loan balances in March of 2020 and remained nearly $16 billion below the amount recorded at the end of 2019. This reduced level of debt among households is largely a result of persistently lower credit card balances, which were over $9 billion lower than the same month one year ago, as total household expenditures declined in 2020.
Overall, the total credit liabilities of households reached $2,472.0 billion by the end of March. Real estate secured debt, composed of both mortgage debt and home equity lines of credit, stood at $1,945.2 billion.
Chart 1
Month-over-month change in household mortgage loans
Private non-financial corporation borrowing eases
In March, private non-financial corporations reduced their outstanding non-mortgage loan liabilities by $5.1 billion. Non-mortgage loans from chartered banks fell $5.7 billion, but this decline was partially offset by roughly $1 billion in new funds provided by the federal government's Canada Emergency Business Account. There were much fewer applicants in March following the expansion of this program in December of 2020. In terms of debt securities, private non-financial corporations recorded net bond issuances of $4.2 billion in March, a significant increase compared with the previous two months of 2021.
Overall, total credit liabilities of private non-financial corporations totalled $2,855.6 billion by the end of the month.
Chart 2
Changes in stock of non-mortgage loans to private non-financial corporations, by lender
Note to readers
Overview of the monthly credit aggregates
The monthly credit aggregates break down a portion of the quarterly National Balance Sheet Accounts (NBSA) into the monthly space, providing details on lending to households and non-financial corporations, or the stock of these sectors' outstanding liabilities from the debtor perspective, across a range of credit instruments including mortgage loans, non-mortgage loans, and debt and equity securities. The aggregates cover all lending sectors, including chartered banks, non-bank deposit-taking institutions, other financial corporations, government and other lenders. The estimates are presented as booked-in-Canada to capture activity within Canada with either domestic or non-resident lenders. Additionally, amounts are reported on an end-of-period basis (i.e., the value of the stock of an asset on the final day of the month). The third month of each quarter is benchmarked to the corresponding quarterly release of the NBSA.
The NBSA are composed of the balance sheets of all sectors and subsectors of the economy. The main sectors are households, non-profit institutions serving households, financial corporations, non-financial corporations, government and non-residents. The NBSA cover all national non-financial assets and all financial asset-liability claims outstanding in all sectors and—similarly—they present stocks as of the end of each quarter.
Estimates are available on a seasonally-adjusted basis to improve the interpretability of period-to-period changes in debt. For information on seasonal adjustment, see Seasonally-adjusted data – Frequently asked questions.
For more information on the concepts, methodologies and classifications used to compile these monthly estimates, please see the document, "Guide to the Monthly Credit Aggregates."
Next release
Data on the monthly credit aggregates for April will be released on June 18, 2021.
Products
The document "Guide to the Monthly Credit Aggregates," which is part of Latest Developments in the Canadian Economic Accounts (13-605-X), is available.
The document "An overview of revisions to the Financial and Wealth Accounts, 1990 to 2020," which is part of Latest Developments in the Canadian Economic Accounts (13-605-X), is available.
The data visualization product "Financial accounts on a from-whom-to-whom basis, selected financial instruments," which is part of Statistics Canada – Data Visualization Products (71-607-X), is available.
The data visualization product "Distributions of Household Economic Accounts, Wealth: Interactive tool," which is part of Statistics Canada – Data Visualization Products (71-607-X), is available.
The data visualization product "Securities statistics," part of the series Statistics Canada – Data Visualization Products (71-607-X), is available.
The Economic accounts statistics portal, accessible from the Subjects module of our website, provides an up-to-date portrait of national and provincial economies and their structure.
The User Guide: Canadian System of Macroeconomic Accounts (13-606-G) is available.
The Methodological Guide: Canadian System of Macroeconomic Accounts (13-607-X) is available.
Contact information
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