Bank of Canada · CAD · Pass-through 88% over 3 months
Average historical spread mortgage − policy rate: 1.75pp. Current spread: -0.70pp. Below the long-run average — competition or asset purchases are compressing the spread.
Policy rate vs. typical fixed mortgage rate; the shaded area is the spread.
Where the typical fixed mortgage rate ends up if the futures-implied policy path holds and the historical spread reverts to its long-run mean.
The four tiles at the top show the live policy rate (set by the central bank), the interbank rate, and the typical fixed and variable mortgage rates available to a household in this country. The gap between the policy rate and the mortgage rate is the spread — what the lender adds on top to cover funding, credit risk and profit.
The first chart shows that spread over the last five years. When the shaded area widens, banks are charging more on top of the policy rate, usually because the long bond market has moved or because banks are pricing in extra risk. When it narrows, competition or central bank bond-buying is squeezing margins. The second chart — the implied 12-month forward path — takes the current futures market's bet on where the policy rate is heading, applies the historical spread, and shows where your mortgage rate would land if both relationships hold. It is not a forecast: it is what current market pricing already implies.
The mortgage-minus-policy spread decomposes into four primary drivers. First, the funding curve: jurisdictions whose lenders fund predominantly via covered bonds (Germany, Denmark, France, Sweden) inherit the swap-plus-covered-spread basis, which moved from 5-15 bp pre-2022 to 25-50 bp during the ECB's APP/PEPP unwind. Lenders funded via deposit franchise (UK, Australia) anchor more to short-rate transmission and deposit beta. US lenders sell loans into agency MBS pools, so the spread is sensitive to the primary-secondary MBS basis and to Fed SOMA reinvestment policy.
Second, prepayment optionality and convexity: products without economic prepayment penalty (US 30Y, Danish callable bonds) trade at OAS rather than nominal spread; OAS widening during rate volatility regimes (VIX-Treasury MOVE comovement) bleeds straight into the borrower rate. Penalty-protected European products (German Festzins under §489 BGB, French indemnité de remboursement anticipé) carry minimal optionality premium. Third, lender duration mismatch: if the dominant local product is short-fixed (UK 2/5Y) the lender's asset-liability gap is small and the spread is stable; if long-fixed (US 30Y, German 10Y) lenders rely on swap and MBS markets to hedge duration, and spread widens when those hedge markets stress. Fourth, regulatory caps and capital treatment: France's taux d'usure, prudential LTV/DTI floors (Switzerland, Australia, Canada), and Basel III risk-weight differentiation across LTV buckets all alter the marginal cost of lending and feed back into quoted rates with lags of one to three quarters.
| Month | Implied Policy Rate | Projected 5-Year Fixed (Insured) | Spread |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-07 | 5.25% | 5.27% | +0.02pp |
| 2026-08 | 5.25% | 5.78% | +0.53pp |
| 2026-09 | 5.25% | 6.13% | +0.89pp |
| 2026-10 | 5.25% | 6.39% | +1.14pp |
| 2026-11 | 5.25% | 6.57% | +1.32pp |
| 2026-12 | 5.25% | 6.70% | +1.45pp |
| 2027-01 | 5.25% | 6.78% | +1.53pp |
| 2027-02 | 5.25% | 6.85% | +1.60pp |
| 2027-03 | 5.25% | 6.89% | +1.64pp |
| 2027-04 | 5.25% | 6.92% | +1.67pp |
| 2027-05 | 5.25% | 6.95% | +1.70pp |
| 2027-06 | 5.25% | 6.96% | +1.71pp |
O Bank of Canada define a Target for the Overnight Rate (a taxa de política). Ela ancora a CORRA (Canadian Overnight Repo Rate Average), o benchmark livre de risco pós-CDOR, e a prime rate publicada pelos bancos (a prime, por convenção, é a taxa de política + 2,20%).
A transmissão hipotecária canadense é moderadamente rápida, mas se distingue de duas formas:
Hipotecas variáveis são reprecificadas a cada decisão do Bank of Canada; as hipotecas fixas de 5 anos são precificadas com base no rendimento do título de 5 anos do governo canadense, mais um spread que reflete o risco de crédito e a concorrência entre credores.
A tabela mostra a fixa de 5 anos típica (segurada), a variável de 5 anos, a CORRA e a taxa overnight do BoC. Em maio de 2026, a fixa de 5 anos está na faixa dos 4% médios — bem abaixo dos picos de 2023-2024.
O spread entre a fixa de 5 anos e a taxa de política teve média de ~1,75 p.p. no período pré-pandemia. Dois episódios notáveis:
O spread da hipoteca variável é estruturalmente mais estreito (~1,4 p.p.), porque as variáveis são precificadas diretamente com base na prime, que se move junto com a taxa de política.
A trajetória de política implícita usa os futuros de CORRA de 3 meses na TMX (produto CRA) — o contrato mais líquido equivalente para os juros de curto prazo canadenses. A hipoteca fixa de 5 anos projetada aplica o spread histórico com um repasse (pass-through) de 88% e defasagem de 3 meses.
Uma ressalva prática: o “teste de estresse” canadense exige que os mutuários se qualifiquem à taxa contratada + 2 pontos percentuais ou 5,25%, o que for maior. Se a trajetória implícita indicar uma queda significativa nas taxas contratadas, o piso de 5,25% do teste de estresse passa a ser a restrição vinculante para a capacidade de tomar crédito, em vez da taxa efetivamente oferecida.
Veja a página do Bank of Canada para as probabilidades das reuniões do BoC.