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: Prime Minister Mark Carney has tapped a longtime executive to head the civil service, the same week Canada’s Auditor-General said Ottawa is sometimes spending its money without “the most basic rules.” Meanwhile one Canadian financial institution wants to make it easier than ever for cash to flow. Which one? Take our quiz and find out.
c. Wealthsimple has unveiled a bevy of new products as it challenges the dominance of Canada’s big banks.
d. Head of Canadian Pacific Railway. Mr. Sabia never led CP Rail. He did, however, serve as a senior executive at Canadian National Railway.
c. Auditor-General Karen Hogan made the comment after publishing a second scathing report on how federal public servants awarded millions of dollars in contracts to GCStrategies, a small IT staffing company, without performing basic checks such as ensuring work was done or that time sheets were reviewed.
b. Alberta said a week ago that it is going to restart purchases of U.S. liquor. Saskatchewan quickly followed suit. Apparently their indignation over U.S. tariffs has a shorter shelf life than a pre-mixed daiquiri.
d. More than 90 per cent. Canada imported just $2.9-million of American wine in April, a 94 per cent decline from the monthly average of $49.2-million last year.
a. Criticizing Donald Trump. Mr. Musk has been busily making nice since publishing online rants in which he called Mr. Trump’s new budget bill a “disgusting abomination” and signalled his support for impeaching the president.
b. Gold. The U.S. dollar is still No. 1 on the central bank hit parade, accounting for 46 per cent of global official reserves last year, according to the European Central Bank. However, gold has surged into second place at 20 per cent, surpassing the euro at 16 per cent. The rising value of bullion on central bank balance sheets is partly a reflection of soaring gold prices, but it also speaks to growing wariness about the greenback. Surging U.S. debt levels and increasing geopolitical tensions are prompting many central banks to seek alternatives to the U.S. dollar.
a. Allegations of deceptive pricing. The bureau says the delivery service’s advertised prices are deceptive because they don’t include additional mandatory charges. DoorDash misleadingly depicts some of these charges as taxes although they are actually fees imposed at the company’s discretion, according to the bureau.
d. A factory for prefabricated homes. Mr. Gilgan founded Mattamy Homes, one of Canada’s largest home builders, and is no stranger to factory-built housing. He launched a prefab homes venture back in the late 1990s but closed it after several money-losing years. He says the time is ripe to try again because of improved technology and stronger government support.
c. The United States. Despite the trade tensions between Canada and the U.S., Davie Shipbuilding said this week it plans to buy shipyards in the Texas cities of Galveston and Port Arthur. Davie intends to use the site to build icebreaker ships for the U.S. government.
b. It is up slightly. Rather amazingly, Boeing’s share price is up about 7 per cent over the past five years (as of Thursday noon). You can see this as a vote of confidence in the company. Or as proof of market irrationality.
a. Less than a pound. The chain has struggled to attract shoppers in an increasingly competitive retail environment. It sold for one euro, which is slightly less than one British pound.