Porter named BMO’S new chief economist
Highly regarded commentator called ‘good and sensible choice’
TORONTO – The appointment of Doug Porter as Bank of Montreal’s new chief economist is being welcomed by the financial community, where he’s regarded as a skilled and effective commentator.
Porter is the “obvious choice, and he’s also a good and sensible choice” for the job, said Finn Poschmann, vice-president of research at the C.D. Howe Institute in Toronto.
As a member of the C.D. Howe Institute’s council on monetary policy, Porter regularly provides input on the Bank of Canada interest rate policy.
“When Doug talks, you listen very carefully,” said Poschmann.
BMO announced on Friday that Porter would succeed Sherry Cooper, one of the best-known economists in the country, when she resigns effective Jan 30.
After more than three decades covering economics for BMO — she joined Burns Fry in 1983 prior to its merger with BMO Capital Markets — Cooper announced her departure on Monday.
Currently deputy chief economist at the bank, Porter held positions as economist and country risk analyst at other financial firms prior to joining BMO in 1995.
He also has worked at the Bank of Canada.
In May, Bloomberg named him best economic forecaster in Canada for the prior two years.
Commentators such as Porter, who is 52, have been garnering much attention among the public, particularly in the past few years as repercussions from the financial crisis continue to reverberate, exacerbating uncertainty about the direction of the economy.
Porter earned a master’s in economics from the University of Western Ontario. Besides being a member of the C.D. Howe Institute’s monetary policy council, he’s also on the board of the Toronto Association of Business Economists, a position he has held since 1996.
“It’s absolutely no surprise that Doug Porter is (getting the job),” said TD chief economist Craig Alexander. “He has a high profile, he’s a superb economist and he’s been covering the Canadian economy and the U.S. economy for years. And frankly, he deserves it.”
Among economy watchers, he is widely known for bringing to light in the early 2000s problems with Statistics Canada’s consumer price index, relating to the improper measurement of hotel charges, a situation that had been going on for several years. The result was that inflation was measurably under-reported.
While the consumer price index is a fairly technical number, it’s also an important benchmark that’s directly connected to monetary policy and wage increases.
More broadly among the public, Porter is recognized for being among the first to draw attention to the price discrepancy between the United States and Canada on many consumer goods.
Canadians have long suspected such a price gap may exist, but Porter was among the first to quantify it in 2007 when he drew up an extensive list of products, from cars to books and greeting cards. He’s been doing it annually ever since.
At first, retailers responded by lowering prices on Canadian products to bring them more into line with the U.S. But over time “it has become more difficult to make comparisons,” he said in an interview, noting that many companies now make it more difficult for consumers to make it direct comparisons.