04:41 PM EDT, 08/02/2024 (MT Newswires) -- Douglas Porter over at BMO Economics in his weekly 'Talking Points' note on Friday noted that while Canada's job numbers aren't out until next Friday, that "volatile series" has taken on added importance amid renewed concerns on the growth outlook. According to Porter, BMO had been saying for more than a year that the firmness in headline employment was "wildly overstating" the health of the economy, as it is being artificially inflated by rapid population growth.

More meaningful, Porter said, has been the steady rise in the unemployment rate, which has deteriorated "even more forcefully" than Stateside. He added there's no argument about decimal points on the Sahm Rule in Canada, as the jobless rate has "blasted higher" by a percentage point in the past year and is up 0.8 ppts from the 12-month low on the 3-month moving average. Indeed, Porter noted, "the number of unemployed people was up 22% y/y in Q2, right on the cusp of meeting the "BMO Rule" (which finds that a rise of more than 25% y/y has always been associated with recession in Canada)."