In the month of May, Canadian investors decreased their holdings of foreign securities while foreigners continued to acquire Canadian securities, according to data released by Statistics Canada.
Foreign investors purchased a net of 11.16 billion Canadian dollars ($8.44 billion) in Canadian securities in May. This followed purchases of 12.78 billion Canadian dollars in the previous month. The majority of the acquisitions were in federal government debt securities, although there was a slight reduction in holdings of Canadian private corporate instruments.
On the other hand, Canadian investors sold 2.78 billion Canadian dollars in foreign securities in May. This came after they had bought 2.37 billion Canadian dollars worth of foreign securities in April. Notably, Canadian investors divested approximately 5.6 billion Canadian dollars worth of U.S. government debt, the largest amount since April 2020. Additionally, Canadian investment in foreign shares slowed to 231 million Canadian dollars for the month compared to around 3.49 billion Canadian dollars in the previous month.
Consequently, these international transactions resulted in a net inflow into the Canadian economy of approximately 13.9 billion Canadian dollars in May.
The monthly international securities report provides insights into transactions involving equity and investment fund shares, bonds, and money market instruments for both Canadian and foreign issuers. However, transactions between affiliated enterprises involving equity and debt instruments are excluded from this report.
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