BEATA CARANCI

Beata Caranci of TD Bank is part of this year's Real Estate Professional's Hot List.

BEATA CARANCI
https://www.td.com/about-tdbfg/our-business/index.jsp
TD Bank
Toronto, ON

Few of Canada’s major financial institutions have been as willing to go on the record about the potential fallout from runaway home prices in the GTA as TD. Beata Caranci, TD’s chief economist since 2015, says the bank’s forthrightness is the natural result of its thorough, industry-leading research.

“We consider ourselves almost as a think tank with the objective to make sure we’re staying in front of the curve in terms of where the risks are evolving,” Caranci says. “Our view is, if it’s important to the bank, it’s important to our clients.”

TD has been vocal in its support for government intervention to stabilize a market in which increased speculation has led to instability and unpredictability. While Caranci says a significant hike in interest rates would be an unfairly applied and potentially ineffective “blunt tool”, she does encourage more active government policy to counter sales activity that is divorced from economic drivers and population figures.

“The sales are too high,” she says.

“They’re looking like they were in the mid-’80s.”