Talk:Banking in Canada

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[edit] Categorization of the various banks in Canada

Did any Canadian lawyer help create this article? I think that to divide all Canadian banks into two broad categories: 1) the "Big Five" banks, and 2) "second tier" banks (i.e. all other banks), is bit simplistic for a Wikipedia article. I will concede that this is how the average Canadian would probably classify the banks given how the Schedule II banks, like HSBC Bank Canada, ING Bank of Canada, and Citibank of Canada, attract alot of Canadian customers while de-emphasizing their foreign connections. However, this article should also emphasize the three legal classes/categories of banks set out in the federal Bank Act because this three-tier system seems like the closest thing to an "official" classification and one which is (sadly) known mostly by lawyers and law students. I wish more people, including bankers and the lowliest tellers, would look at the three schedules of the Bank Act more often.

It is disgusting how many ordinary Canadians made reference to the name "TD Canada Trust" and don't realize that it is a simply a business name and misleading moniker to hide from patrons of the defunct Canada Trust the fact that they have unwittingly become customers of the Toronto Dominion Bank, a bank which they may have hated when they were account holders with Canada Trust. Bank mergers is a hot-button political issue here in Canada. The Toronto Dominion Bank, which was commonly referred to as "TD Bank" prior to its complete takeover/swallowing of Canada Trust, is wise to adopt a hybrid-like business name like "TD Canada Trust" to fool patrons of the defunct Canada Trust into believing that much publicized (and criticized) the TD Bank - Canada Trust deal was a merger of two banks, like the creation of CIBC, and not a takeover by one big bank and the weakest of the old "Big Six" from the 1980s and early 1990s. "Big Six" has turned into "Big Five", and God help Canadian consumers if "Big Four" or "Big Three" is somewhere in the foreseeable future.

User:Alf74 9:22, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm rewriting my comments. IANAL and made the original edits. I personally don't have a problem with TD's brand management strategy. It's not like Canada Trust customers don't see the big TD on their statements and realize they were absorbed into TD's customer base. Deet 23:42, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

The other banks, or the Schedual two banks do not mean much in Canada. Living in Canada their branches might make up about 1% of all bank branches, and their market share is very small. The smallest major bank is equal to them all added up probably multiplied by a factor of 20. Their market penetration is next to nothing. --74.104.48.172 16:35, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I do not dispute that the Schedule II banks have little market presence in Canada AS A WHOLE. However, try visiting any of the big Canadian cities like Toronto or Vancouver, or even Ottawa or Hamilton, and you will notice a lot of HSBC banks. In Vancouver, in particular, there are probably as many HSBC banks as any one of the Big Five banks, and certainly more branches of HSBC Bank Canada than the Schedule I National Bank (which are seemingly everywhere in Ottawa.) It seems to me that Schedule II banks (and I am not just talking about HSBC) are more present in big cities with large immigrant communities, such as the Chinese immigrant community. Go into any HSBC bank and you will surely find a Chinese-looking teller who can speak either Cantonese or Mandarin and make the Chinese immigrant bank customer feel like he/she is in Hong Kong again. Of course, if one lives in Kenora, Swift Current or somewhere else outside the big cities, it is a totally different story. User:Alf74 10:15, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Creation of Money

Money is created by a combination of commercial banks and the Bank of Canada.

"The Bank of Canada is not able to control the money supply directly, because the deposit portion of the money supply results from decisions made within the private banking system. By taking deposits from individual Canadian households and firms and then lending these funds, the commercial banks, in essence, "create" money because, in theory, the new funds will be redeposited in the banking system. However, the money-creation powers of the commercial banks are constrained by 2 factors. First, if interest yields on other financial assets rise, Canadians will probably choose to hold a relatively smaller portion of their wealth as coin, currency and (largely low-yield) money deposits. Second, the banks are limited in loan expansion by the need to retain reserves (basically cash in the vault, and deposits of the individual banks at the Bank of Canada) to meet possible withdrawal needs. By altering interest rates and the level of banking reserves, or both, the Bank of Canada can manipulate the money supply indirectly with a high degree of precision (particularly over periods of 3 to 6 months or longer)."

- Canadian Encyclopedia

--Omnicog 18:02, 3 April 2007 (UTC)