Bank of Canada lowers overnight rate target by 0.25% to 0.25%

This is a surprise cut to many, including myself because it makes Money almost free.

Also means a few things to me

- No need to find Fixed Rate Mortgage for a while as BoC sees this rate continuing into 2010. My HELOC is at 2.25% now, while mortgages are 1.x%

- I should repay my 0% Credit Card arbitrage soon as the spread is so little now when the money is sitting in a 2% savings account

- More incentives to research good investment opportunities (yield, growth equities)

Target for the overnight rate, recent data from Bank of Canada

(can you imagine one year ago we were at 3.5%)

Date	Target (%)	Change (%)
21 April 2009	0.25	- 0.25
3 March 2009	0.50	- 0.50
20 January 2009	1.00	- 0.50
9 December 2008	1.50	- 0.75
21 October 2008	2.25	- 0.25
8 October 2008	2.50	- 0.50
15 July 2008	3.00	---
10 June 2008	3.00	---
22 April 2008	3.00	- 0.50
4 March 2008	3.50	- 0.50

January 20, 2009 - Historical Day for Barack Obama, and Jerry

Mark this day on the calendar, January 20, 2009

• Barack Obama 2009 Presidential Inauguration, with record coverage, record crowd, and a sense of hope for a brighter future. Sounds a bit like 馬英九 in March 2008 for Taiwan. I didn't watch it online at work though, but PVR'ed it at home, and also sees it on BitTorrent

• Bank of Canada lowers overnight rate target by 1/2 percentage point to 1 per cent, saving me a few thounsands on the mortgage especially considering all banks follow suit with 0.50% drop in bank's prime rate

• Jerry Hung, myself, successfully passed my 3 months probation at the new job, and now I am a bit safer and stuck here :)

• This is not really historical in anyway, but I got myself a MSI Wind U100 netbook - MSI Wind 10" Mini Laptop (1.6 GHz Intel Atom Processor, 1 GB RAM, 80 GB Hard Drive, XP Home, 3 Cell Battery) Black. Let's see what the fuzz is all about