Bullets

Current business highlights

•Municipalities in Canada issued building permits worth $8.2 billion in October, down 14.6 per cent from the previous month but only down 3.3 per cent from the same period last year. September’s peak was the second highest value on record, with October’s results more in line with recent months. —Statistics Canada

•Total investment in building construction rose 1.1 per cent to $15.2 billion in October, over the same period in 2019. In addition, investment in residential construction edged up 0.7 per cent in October, a sixth consecutive monthly gain. —Statistics Canada

•The October Interior Design Billings Index moved up three index points to 55.4, and the inquiry index rose nearly five index points to 57.5 over September’s scores. (Any score above 50 represents expansion and below 50 represents contraction.) —ASID

•U.S. ceramic tile consumption through Q3 2020 was 2.04 billion sq. ft., an 11.6 per cent decline versus Q3 2019 yearto-date. —Tile Council of North America

•The Architectural Billings Index (ABI) score of U.S. architectural firms rose 0.5 from September to 47.5 in October, indicating that the share of firms seeing their billings decline shrank further. (An ABI score below 50 indicates a billings decline.) In addition, 60 per cent of firms have seen higher prices/more limited availability of construction materials in the last six to 12 months. —AIA

•A research survey shows that 77 per cent of adults in the U.S. think the climate is changing, with human activity solely or partly responsible. The research also found 42 per cent of adults in the U.S. believe we can avoid the worst effects of climate change but only by making radical changes to how we live our lives. The survey found 50 per cent of respondents said that other generations will be the first to experience real noticeable change to their day-to-day life because of climate change, while 24 per cent said the effects would be felt in their generation. —Institution of Engineering and Technology

•In a report that highlights the most (and least) competitive real estate markets across Ontario outside the Greater Toronto Area, Guelph was found to be the most competitive with an average home price of $741,746 in October, up 17 per cent from the same month last year. —Zoocasa • By the end of September, gross merchandise sales of masks sold on online crafts marketplace Etsy amounted to more than $600 million US, contributing more than 10 per cent of total gross merchandise sales (GMS) in both the second and third quarter of 2020. Not counting mask sales, the GMS would still have doubled between April and September, when compared to the same period of 2019. —Etsy

•In 2019, new registrations in Canada’s apprenticeship programs were down by 2.9 per cent and certifications in the trades fell 3.9 per cent from 2018, as losses in Alberta offset gains in Ontario and Quebec. —Statistics Canada

•Imports of assembled flooring into Japan year-on-year in

September were up eight per cent, and there was an 11 per cent increase over the value of August imports. —Japan Ministry of Finance

•U.S. imports of hardwood flooring rose seven per cent in

September, the fourth monthly gain. Yet the gains are still not enough to catch last year’s imports as the monthly total was still more than 20 per cent less than that of the previous September, and year-to-date totals remain down nearly 30 per cent. —Foreign Trade Statistics

•EU27 tropical flooring imports posted a slight recovery of two per cent in the first eight months of this year after a long and persistent period of decline. —Eurostat

•A new study, The Crude Tall Oil Value Chain: Global Availability and the Influence of Regional Energy Policies, forecasts an eight per cent deficit of crude tall oil (CTO) global availability for all applications by 2030. According to the study, this deficit is due to the high demand of CTO for transportation-related biofuels. —The Journal of Cleaner Production

•According to its Canada 2021 Salary Guide, 71 per cent of employers are optimistic about the future Canadian employment outlook, while 40 per cent of employers are intending to integrate remote work as part of their normal practices. —Hays

•Nearly half of Canadian equipment manufacturing companies that responded to a survey indicated it will take one year or longer to get back to pre-pandemic business levels, and 50 per cent say they have used or intend to use the federal

Covid-19 assistance program to help their businesses. —Association of Equipment Manufacturers