According to a report this week, which company is looking at laying off a fifth of its workforce?SolStock/iStockPhoto / Getty Images
Welcome to The Globe and Mail’s business and investing news quiz. Join us each week to test your knowledge of the stories making headlines. Our business reporters come up with the questions, and you can show us what you know.
This week: We had rate decisions from both the U.S. Fed and the BoC this week, and, in other economic news, a major tech company is planning to lay off a fifth of its work force because of a focus on AI. Also, Canadian comedian Russell Peters is suing his tax advisers. Why? Take our quiz and find out.
c. Both the Bank of Canada and the U.S. Federal Reserve decided to do absolutely nothing. They left short-term interest rates unchanged and their inaction makes sense: If central banks raise interest rates to offset the inflationary impact of higher oil prices, they risk slowing down economies that are already under pressure from higher energy prices.
a, b, c, d. Young people were once, on average, the happiest Canadian cohort; now they’re the most miserable. Their level of life satisfaction has sunk to 71st in the world, according to the World Happiness Report. This is truly an unhappy result.
a. Meta Platforms shares jumped this week following a Reuters report that the social-media giant plans to lay off 20 per cent or more of its work force to offset heavy spending on artificial intelligence and bet on productivity gains from the technology.
d. Canada’s population declined by around 102,000 people in 2025, the first annual decline in records that date back to the 1940s. After years of overseeing breakneck population growth, the federal government is cracking down on the number of temporary residents in the country.
b. The federal government wants to enable satellite launches in Canada as part of its plan to boost national defence capabilities. To help matters along, Ottawa will lease a dedicated space-launch pad at Spaceport Nova Scotia, a facility near Canso, N.S., being built by Halifax-based Maritime Launch Services.
d. BCE will will build the data centre outside Regina. It said the facility will be the largest of its kind in Canada once completed. Demand for data centres is booming as governments and companies race to invest in AI.
c. Encyclopedia Britannica and its Merriam-Webster subsidiary sued OpenAI for allegedly misusing their reference materials to train its artificial intelligence models.
a. Mr. Peters has launched a lawsuit against two of his long-time Canadian tax advisers after he was found liable for several years of backdated California income taxes. The problem emerged when a state tax authority concluded he was actually a resident of California during the years in question rather than a resident of Nevada, as Mr. Peters had claimed.
c. Mr. Henry is leaving his role as chief executive officer of BHP Group, the world’s biggest mining company. He plans to step down this summer and will be succeeded by Brandon Craig, who runs the company’s Americas division.
d. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s crackdown on major grocers for “maple washing” has raised concerns among food manufacturers, who fear its battle against overstating a product’s ties to Canada could unintentionally lead retailers to invest less in Canadian products.
a. Sources say the Weston family, which oversees the Loblaw grocery empire, is funding the launch of a national digital-media startup. The online publication, being developed under the working title Be Giant, is preparing to launch this spring.
b. Mr. Smith, co-founder of mortgage lender First National Financial Corp., is buying a 26.7-per-cent stake in The Economist. Founded in 1843, the current-affairs publication has 1.25 million subscribers and has evolved from a weekly magazine to a digital platform.