Darn those Canadians

When faced with the same economic circumstances as the US in the meltdown days and with essentially only 5 banks, Canada weather the storm quite nicely. How? regulation, regulation, regulation.

This tendency to react to the mere mention of Canada with either yawns or guffaws may be why, as the world struggles to figure out what went wrong in 2007 and 2008, not much international attention is being devoted to figuring out what went right in Canada. Canada is the only G7 country to survive the financial crisis without a state bail-out for its financial sector. Two of the world’s 15 most highly valued financial institutions – a list dominated by China – are Canadian and a recent World Economic Forum report rated the Canadian banking system the world’s soundest. Even Barack Obama, on the eve of a visit last year to Ottawa, the Canadian ­capital, admitted: “In the midst of the enormous economic crisis, I think Canada has shown itself to be a pretty good manager of the financial system and the economy in ways that we haven’t always been.”