CHHMA - EYE ON OUR INDUSTRY
Volume 15, Issue 29, August 12, 2015

Inside This Issue:

• Register Now for the 14th Annual Industry Memorial Golf Classic on September 30th
• CHHMA Announces Scholarship Program Recipients for 2015
• Ontario Plans to Phase In New Pension Plan Beginning in 2017
• Experts Divided on Effect of Home Renovation Tax Break Pledge
• Orgill’s Canadian Operation to Acquire Chalifour Hardline Assets
• RONA Reports Best Quarterly Results in 3 Years, Raises Dividend
• Target to Rebrand CityTarget, TargetExpress Stores as Just Target
• China Devalues Yuan by 2%, Sees Biggest One-Day Fall Since 1994
• Canada’s Economy Could ‘Stop Bleeding’ Soon, Business Confidence Rebounding: Conference Board
• Housing Starts Decline in July
• Building Permits in Canada Jump 14.8% in June
• Canadian Economy Adds 6,600 Jobs in July, But Full-Time Hiring Declines
• Canada Headed for Worst ‘Non-Recession’ in 50 Years, BMO Warns
• Steadily Improving U.S. Jobs Market Supportive of Fed Rate Hike


Association News

Register Now for the 14th Annual Industry Memorial Golf Classic on September 30th

The 14th Annual Industry Memorial Golf Classic is taking place on Wednesday, September 30th at the Blue Springs Golf Club in Acton, Ontario.
The event is held on behalf of the hardware and housewares industry and it honours stalwarts from the industry who have passed away. CHHMA members and non-members are welcome to attend.

This year’s honourees will be: David Fry (Shop-Vac Canada), Ted Kennedy (Rubbermaid Canada, Past CHHMA Chairman 1975-76) & Geoff Somers (Wentworth Corporation, Somerset House)

Past honourees include: Ray Ceolin, Tom Ross, Bruce Webster, Chris Hrushowy, Mike Pullen, Jim Ypma, Bill Caldwell, Brayl Copp, Ed Hardison, Stuart North, Joseph Kuchar, Shelly Lush, Jack Pountney, Christof Vanooteghem, Ian Hay, Trygve Husebye, Bernie Carpenter, Don McDonald, Les Groves, Bob Hilton, Doug Straus, Mel Boshart, George Giles and Ed Barnes.

The day allows family, friends and colleagues to honour these gentlemen while enjoying a fun day out on the golf course followed by a dinner and silent auction.

The event will start off with registration and lunch at 10:30 a.m. with a shotgun start at noon.Dinner will commence at around 6:00 p.m.  

Money raised from hole sponsorships and a silent auction will go towards the CHHMA Scholarship Program which provides support for children of CHHMA member company employees to attend university or college.

Click here to register online or click here for a: PDF registration form as well as a PDF silent auction pledge form



CHHMA Announces Scholarship Program Recipients for 2015

The CHHMA Board of Directors is pleased to announce the Scholarship Award recipients for 2015. The finalists were chosen for their outstanding achievement by a panel of independent judges. This year we are pleased to present five award winners. Since 2001, the CHHMA has awarded $160,000 towards scholarships and some 80 young people have benefited from the scholarship program. Recipients receive $1,000 per year for the first two years of study at an accredited post-secondary institution.  Read More >>



Government & Legislative News

Ontario Plans to Phase In New Pension Plan Beginning in 2017

The Ontario Liberal government plans to phase in its provincial pension plan beginning ‎in 2017, with benefits paid out to workers starting in 2022.  All employees in Ontario will belong to a workplace pension plan of one kind or another in five years after the proposed Ontario Retirement Pension Plan (ORPP) is implemented, Premier Kathleen Wynne said at a briefing Tuesday.  Wynne said she is determined to push forward on the made-in-Ontario pension plan despite the critics.

“I believe it is the right thing to do,” Wynne said of the plan, noting that two-thirds of Ontario workers have no pension plan other than the Canada Pension Plan (CPP).  About 3.5 million workers will be part of the made-in-Ontario plan, which has become a flashpoint between Premier Wynne and Prime Minister Stephen Harper in the early days of the federal election campaign.  Read More >>



Experts Divided on Effect of Home Renovation Tax Break Pledge

Experts are divided on what impact a federal Conservative promise to revive a home renovation tax credit could have on the real estate industry, with some predicting it could add more fuel to red-hot housing markets while others say it likely wouldn’t have any impact at all.

Ahmed Helmi, a Toronto-area real estate broker with Royal LePage Real Estate Services Ltd., says the tax rebate could encourage homeowners to renovate and stay put, leading to lower inventories on the market.
 
But Toronto broker Desmond Brown says Stephen Harper’s election campaign promise to make the renovation tax credit permanent — which the prime minister said is contingent on economic circumstances — is “not going to make an impact at all” because the amount of money offered is too low.  Read More >>    



Industry News

Orgill’s Canadian Operation to Acquire Chalifour Hardline Assets

TIM-BR MART Group announced on Tuesday the sale of the hardlines assets of its distribution arm, Chalifour Canada Ltd. to Orgill Canada Hardlines, ULC, a wholly owned, Canadian-based subsidiary of Orgill, Inc. 

Orgill Canada’s acquisition of the assets will include their complete ownership and operation of Chalifour Canada’s London, Ontario, distribution center, as well as the ownership of the hardware inventory in Chalifour Canada’s Surrey, British Columbia facility.  TIM-BR MART will maintain ownership and operation of their lumber and building material (LBM) distribution center in Saint-Nicolas, Quebec, and continue to operate their Surrey facility, including Orgill Canada’s hardlines offering from that location. Orgill Canada will ultimately integrate Orgill, Inc.’s current Canadian operations into the London facility.  Read More >>



RONA Reports Best Quarterly Results in 3 Years, Raises Dividend

RONA inc. reported its best quarterly results in more than three years on Tuesday as it raised its dividend 14%.  The company said its net profit attributable to shareholders was up 19.1% to $49.9 million or 46 cents per share for the three months ended June 28. That's up from $42 million or 35 cents per share a year earlier.

RONA also announced it will pay a quarterly dividend of four cents per share on Sept. 25. In the past, it paid a 14 cents per share annual dividend distributed twice a year, but it will now move to a quarterly payout.

Revenues in RONA's busiest quarter of the year increased 5.9% to $1.26 billion from $1.19 billion a year ago.  Read More >> 



Target to Rebrand CityTarget, TargetExpress Stores as Just Target

As Target Corp. began rolling out smaller-format stores in the past few years, their names — CityTarget and TargetExpress — sometimes sparked confusion.  While CityTarget stores located in dense urban areas are generally smaller than Target’s other big-box stores, that wasn’t the case with the CityTarget store that opened last month next to Fenway Park in Boston.  So now, Target is jettisoning those CityTarget and TargetExpress labels and will soon rebrand all of them as just Target.  Read More >>     



Economic News

China Devalues Yuan by 2%, Sees Biggest One-Day Fall Since 1994

China devalued its currency on Tuesday after a run of poor economic data, a move it billed as a free-market reform but which some suspect could be the beginning of a longer-term slide in the exchange rate.  The central bank set its official guidance rate down nearly 2% to 6.2298 yuan per dollar – its lowest point in almost three years – in what it said was a change in methodology to make it more responsive to market forces.  It was the biggest one-day fall since a massive devaluation in 1994 when China aligned its official and market rates.  Read More >>



Canada’s Economy Could ‘Stop Bleeding’ Soon, Business Confidence Rebounding: Conference Board

Canadian businesses appear surprisingly upbeat these days, optimistic that the worst of the oil shock-driven economic slump is likely behind them and the “bleeding” will stop soon.

“Critically, the pessimism regarding the general economy has mostly subsided,” the Conference Board of Canada said Monday. “The return in confidence is translating into stronger investment intentions.”

The Conference Board’s closely monitored index of business confidence rebounded in the second quarter of 2015, rising to a reading of 105.6, after two consecutive quarterly declines that pushed the index to a six-year low of 86.5.  Read More >>



Housing Starts Decline in July

Canadian housing starts fell more than expected in July from June but were broadly in line with demographic fundamentals and analysts said housing remained a bright spot in Canada’s otherwise sluggish economy.  The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) reported on Tuesday that the seasonally adjusted annualized rate (SAAR) of housing starts fell 4.6% to 193,032 in July from a downwardly revised 202,338 units in June. Forecasters had expected 195,000 starts.  Read More >> 



Building Permits in Canada Jump 14.8% in June

The total value of building permits issued in June beat expectations and wiped out a decline from the month before, jumping 14.8% to $7.7 billion, mainly because of apartment and condo construction projects, according to Statistics Canada data last Friday. 

Analysts had forecast an increase of only 5.0%. May's decline was revised to 13.9% from 14.5%.  Read More >>



Canadian Economy Adds 6,600 Jobs in July, But Full-Time Hiring Declines


Canada added an estimated 6,600 jobs in July from June, in a mixed report from Statistics Canada last Friday that left analysts concluding that while the economy was not spectacular, it was at least “steady as she goes.”  The gain in July nearly mirrored a fall in June while holding on to May’s outsized gain of 58,900. The average increase is 19,700 jobs in the last three months and 11,200 in the last half year.   The unemployment rate held at 6.8% for the sixth straight month.  Read More >> 



Canada Headed for Worst ‘Non-Recession’ in 50 Years, BMO Warns

Canada’s economy is heading for its worst non-recession showing in more than 50 years, the Bank of Montreal warns.  But while the first half of 2015 was ugly, the rest of the year should show a pick-up, BMO said in a new forecast last week. We already know that the Canadian economy contracted at an annual pace of 0.6% in the first three months of the year, and BMO now believes it shrank 1% in the second quarter.  Read More >>



Steadily Improving U.S. Jobs Market Supportive of Fed Rate Hike  

U.S. employment rose at a solid clip in July and wages rebounded after a surprise stall in the prior month, signs of an improving economy that could open the door wider to a Federal Reserve interest rate hike in September.  Nonfarm payrolls increased 215,000 last month as a pickup in construction ad manufacturing employment offset further declines in the mining sector, the Labor Department said last Friday. The unemployment rate held at a seven-year low of 5.3%.  Read More >>

  

 Upcoming CHHMA Events 

Industry Memorial Golf Classic
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
Blue Springs Golf Club, Acton, Ontario

Industry Cocktail
Date TBA, December, 2015
Location TBA, Montreal, Quebec

Canada Night
Held in Conjunction with the International Home+Housewares Show
Sunday, March 6, 2016
InterContinental Hotel, Chicago, Illinois

CHHMA Spring Conference & AGM
Date TBA, April, 2016
International Centre (Conference Facility), Mississauga, Ontario

CHHMA Maple Leaf Night
Held in Conjunction with the National Hardware Show
Tuesday, May 3, 2016
The Mirage Hotel & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada

CHHMA Quebec Golf Classic
Thursday, May 26, 2016
Club de golf Le Fontainebleau, Blainville, Quebec

CHHMA Ontario Golf Tournament
Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Angus Glen Golf Club, Markham, Ontario
       
       

CHHMA Industry Calendar

To register for all events visit our website at www.chhma.ca or call Pam Winter at (416) 282-0022 ext.21.


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"Eye On Our Industry" is published by the CHHMA as an information resource for our members. Member input regarding content and format is welcomed. Please contact Michael Jorgenson by email: mjorgenson@chhma.ca, or call at (416) 282-0022, ext. 34. CHHMA is located at 1335 Morningside Ave., Suite 101, Scarborough, ON, M1B 5M4 www.chhma.ca

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