Canada's gross domestic product grew less than economists predicted in May as a manufacturing decline curbed gains in energy and retailing.
Output rose 0.1 percent to an annualized C$1.29 trillion ($1.28 trillion), following gains of 0.3 percent in April and 0.1 percent in March,
Statistics Canada said today in
Ottawa. The May increase was less than the 0.2 percent forecast by the median of a
Bloomberg economist survey with 23 responses.
Slowing growth suggests
Bank of Canada Governor
Mark Carney, who has kept the central bank's key lending rate at 1 percent since September 2010, the longest pause since the 1950s, probably won't raise borrowing costs any time soon. Carney cut his second-quarter growth forecast earlier this month to 1.8 percent, and said weaker global demand would curb the expansion through next year.
"It's tough to be able to see the bank raise rates any time soon," said Benjamin Reitzes, an economist at
BMO Capital Markets in
Toronto, who expects the central bank will continue its rate pause for another year.
The Bank of Canada is relying on business investment and consumer spending for economic growth in what it calls the slowest export recovery since World War II.
Canada's dollar slipped 0.1 percent to C$1.0028 per U.S. dollar at 10:33 a.m. in Toronto. One Canadian dollar buys 99.72
U.S. cents...