Skip to main content
illustration of four buildings, which look like newsletter articles with a sun in the background

Business Brief

Sent weekday mornings

A daily look at the most important business stories that are making news and moving markets, written by Chris Wilson-Smith

View sample

Latest editions of the Business Brief

newsletter
Business Brief: Canadian defence takes off
Pilot William "Billy" Mitchell. Dec 15, 2025
newsletter
Business Brief: Untangling Roots
Inside a Roots store yesterday in Toronto's Eaton Centre. The company has grown from a niche shoemaker in 1973 to more than 100 stores across Canada.
newsletter
Business Brief: How oil makes and moves the world
Water is filled into bottles made from a byproduct of polymer resin at a manufacturing plant in Dhaula Kuan, India.
newsletter
Business Brief: War and the world economy
From factory jobs and consumer prices, to supply chains and trade flows, we take a visual look at how the global economy has changed in the past year.
newsletter
Business Brief: Five files to follow this week
Thousands gathered yesterday for a pro-government demonstration in Tehran after Iranian state media confirmed the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
newsletter
Business Brief: Why are universities cutting sports?
Simon Fraser University’s Monica Bourque throws a pitch at the Scrap Yard Sports Complex in Houston, Texas. Jan. 31.
newsletter
Business Brief: Be audit you can be
There's a lot going on here, I know. But consider its Dali-like expression of temporal boundaries, transient currency, finite grains of sand bleeding into gold, the world ever-twirling. Tax season.
newsletter
Business Brief: Price checks and balances
Trump delivers his State of the Union address last night.
newsletter
Business Brief: Food fright
A No Frills in Toronto — No. 1 among more shoppers.
newsletter
Business Brief: Five files to follow this week
We know what the President looks like. Instead, here is a picture of imported beer taken on Friday at a grocery store in Chicago. Importers are pressing for refunds on duties they've paid.
newsletter
Business Brief: How Canada became poorer than Alabama
Annie Buckland works inside CoLab at the Hudson Alpha Research Park in Huntsville Alabama on February 6th, 2026.
newsletter
Business Brief: Melting down the medals
Speed skater Steven Dubois holds his gold medal yesterday in Milan. An Olympic gold medal containing 523 grams of silver plated with six grams of gold has a raw material value of about $2,300 to $2,500 U.S. dollars.
newsletter
Business Brief: A house of cards
nw-na-real-estate-collapse
newsletter
Business Brief: Five files to follow this week
A supermarket in Switzerland. The country reported on Friday that consumer prices were 0.1 per cent higher in January than in the same month of last year. Inflation has hovered near zero in Switzerland for much of the past decade, occasionally dipping into negative territory.
newsletter
Business Brief: Hold, please
A person walks past the TMX Market Centre in Toronto. Sept. 11, 2024.
newsletter
Business Brief: Triaging Trump’s threats
President Donald Trump in the Oval Office earlier this month.
newsletter
Business Brief: Can the silver screen be saved?
Ryan Gosling stars as Ryland Grace in an upcoming metaphor for big-screen theatre chains.
newsletter
Business Brief: The other high-stakes games
No Carney at the Olympics? At least Snoop is sporting red.
newsletter
Business Brief: Five files to follow this week
Traders at work on Friday at the New York Stock Exchange. Same, traders. Same.
newsletter
Business Brief: Olympic housing that deserves a medal
The main building of the athletes’ residence, Olympic Village. Feb. 4, 2026
newsletter
Business Brief: Mined, all mined
Say cesium! Marco Rubio greets Anita Anand yesterday in Washington.
newsletter
Business Brief: What’s up with CAAT?
CAAT pension documents.
newsletter
Business Brief: How Harper helped Carney
Stephen Harper meets in 2011 with former finance minister Jim Flaherty and Mark Carney, who was then governor of the Bank of Canada.
newsletter
Business Brief: Five up this week
A bear, a hawk and a Canadian walk into a bar chart. (That's Fed-chief-in-waiting Kevin Warsh walking next to Mark Carney at a central banking summit in 2010.)
newsletter
Business Brief: Canada is a launchpad in race for generic Ozempic
Lake Como (Italy): A state-of-the-art custom designed production line is shown in the final stages of acceptance testing before being shipped to Edmonton AB, where it will be installed into Applied Pharmaceutical Innovation (API)'s manufacturing facility to make Vimy's generic Ozempic in 2026. The Italian manufacturer Steriline S.r.l. tests a bowl of caps to close the vial (RXVFCM55-R for robotic, X because it's both powder and liquid, V for vial, F for filling, C for capping, M for machine, 55 transports 5 vials and fills 5 vials). Oct 24th, 2025
newsletter
Business Brief: Steady rates in uncertain times
Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem is seen during a news conference in Ottawa on Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
newsletter
Business Brief: Rise of the robotaxis
A Waymo robotaxi drives along California Street on Dec. 8, 2025 in San Francisco, California.
newsletter
Business Brief: The price of protection
Part of the railway that connects the Port of Churchill to everything south.
newsletter
Business Brief: Five files to follow this week
A police officer throws a can of tear gas at protesters in Minneapolis on Saturday.
newsletter
Business Brief: Heralding the age of Western decline
Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney appears on a screen as he speaks during the 56th annual World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos, Switzerland, January 20, 2026. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY
newsletter
Business Brief: What we learned from Davos
Sunset yesterday in Nuuk, Greenland.
newsletter
Business Brief: Why bond markets could hold Trump back
Trump takes questions from media yesterday at the White House.
newsletter
Business Brief: An idea to save Canada’s troubled auto sector
How Canada’s auto sector can survive its terrible, no-good, very bad year.
newsletter
Business Brief: Five files to follow this week
A drone view of Davos, where global leaders will be afforded the chance to "connect the dots and catalyze problem solving across global challenges," according to the forum's website. If ever there was a time to roll up our sleeves and catalyze, this is it.
newsletter
Business Brief: The rise of cybercrime-as-a-service
Microsoft claims that RedVDS is enabling cybercrimes such as phishing, scams, payment diversion fraud and more.
newsletter
Business Brief: How Iran shapes the world
Iranians hold portraits of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a funeral for security forces killed in recent protests.