Current Affairs
Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin on Monday announced it wants to launch a space station that will house up to 10 people in the second half of the decade, as the race to commercialize the cosmos heats up.
“Orbital Reef,” described in a press statement as a mixed-use business park in space that will support microgravity research and manufacturing, is a joint venture with commercial space company Sierra Space and has the support of Boeing and Arizona State University.
“For over sixty years, NASA and other space agencies have developed orbital space flight and space habitation, setting us up for commercial business to take off in this decade,” said Blue Origin executive Brent Sherwood.
“We will expand access, lower the cost, and provide all the services and amenities needed to normalize space flight.”
The private outpost is one of several planned in the coming years as NASA considers the future of the International Space Station after the 2020s…read more.
High lumber prices are back, even as the industry steps into what is normally a seasonal lull.
Prices are climbing amid tight supplies and a pickup in homebuilding. Western Canada is seeing reduced output and the U.S. south is grappling with labor shortages. The U.S. is also expected to double duties on a common Canadian wood next month, adding to costs.
The rise signals that homebuyers will face elevated prices for longer. On Tuesday, lumber futures were trading around US$735.70 per 1,000 board feet in Chicago, more than double the pre-pandemic five-year average around US$356.
Wood prices have been volatile, whipsawing since the pandemic began. They touched record highs amid a COVID-19 inspired home-building boom, then collapsed because sawmills ramped up production and the high prices stifled retail demand. Now, the market is shooting up again…read more.
Metro Vancouver’s annual utility fees are projected to climb 65% over the next half-decade to almost $1,000 annually by 2026, a massive spike as the region races to replace costly and aging infrastructure.
In 2021, a household paid roughly $574 to the regional body, a collection of 21 municipalities, Electoral Area A at UBC and the Tsawwassen First Nation. In return, Metro provides most of the local authorities with clean tap water, a sewage network, regional parks and a system to recycle and process garbage.
Next year, the 2022 proposed budget is expected to go up $21 to $595.
But by 2026, that yearly rate is expected to climb to $952, a $378 increase from today, according to a Metro Vancouver 2022 capital budget and 2022-2026 capital plan revealed last week.
“There will be significant increases over the next number of years. Period,” Metro Commissioner Jerry Dobrovolny told the finance and intergovernment committee…read more.
Bitcoin (BTC) marking a new high of $67,000 last week has opened the possibility of hitting $100,000 by the end of this year.
PlanB, creator of the popular Bitcoin Stock-to-Flow (S2F) model, called Bitcoin’s price retracement from the $60,000-level the “2nd leg” of what appeared like a long-term bull market.
In doing so, the pseudonymous analyst cited S2F, which anticipates Bitcoin to continue its leg higher and reach $100,000 to $135,000 by the end of the year.
The price projection model insists that Bitcoin’s value will keep on growing until at least $288,000 per token due to the “halving,” an event that takes place every four years and reduces BTC’s issuance rate by half against its 21 million supply cap.
Notably, Bitcoin has undergone three halvings so far: in 2012, 2016 and 2020.
Each event decreased the cryptocurrency’s new supply rate by 50%, which was followed by notable increases in BTC price. For instance, the first two halvings prompted BTC price to rise by over 10,000% and 2,960%, respectively.
The third halving caused the price to jump from $8,787 to as high as $66,999, a 667.50% increase. So far, S2F has been largely accurate in predicting Bitcoin’s price trajectory, as shown in the chart below, leaving bulls with higher hopes that Bitcoin’s post-halving rally will have its price cross the $100,000 mark…read more.
Canada’s largest banks could raise their dividends as much as 25 per cent once regulators allow them to increase their payouts, according to an investment firm that focuses on financial stocks.
The dividend increase of 20 per cent to 25 per cent could happen even if the banks’ earnings growth stalls, Toronto-based Hamilton Capital Partners said in a note Tuesday. The hikes could be even larger if bank executives want to slow the growth in their capital levels, the firm said.
Canada’s largest banks socked away record amounts of capital during the pandemic to protect against a wave of defaults that never occurred, while also seeing core earnings measures rise.
At the same time, Canada’s Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions has prevented them from buying back shares or increasing dividends since March 2020, prompting capital to pile up even more. Canada’s lenders are now “among the best-capitalized banks globally” and are sitting on $21.4 billion (US$17.3 billion) in allowances against loans that are still in good standing, according to Hamilton Capital, which was co-founded by former National Bank of Canada analyst Rob Wessel…read more.
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