The chief executive of the Bank of Nova Scotia says Canada’s housing market needs more supply, not a major change to the mortgage stress test.
Scotiabank president and CEO Brian Porter says while the stress test is “something that you have to look at occasionally, for sure,” the move by the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, a federal banking regulator, to bring in the measure at the start of 2018 was appropriate.
“I don’t think a lot of tinkering is necessary on the stress test,” Porter told the Financial Post in an interview at the bank’s investor day in Chile last month. “But we have to make sure that these housing markets are in balance. So, rather than look at the demand side of the equation, let’s look at the supply side. Everybody wants to talk about the demand side without looking at the supply side.”