Good morning, good folks! Yesterday was a busy business day, so let’s get straight to the main stories you’ll be hearing about even before your first meeting of the day. <\/p>\n
TRANS MOUNTAIN I<\/strong><\/p>\n Claudia Cattaneo<\/a> writes that B.C. premier John Horgan<\/a> is responding with so much indifference over the distress he\u2019s causing in his attempt to block the Trans Mountain pipeline, that his constituents should worry about his judgment. She lists the many ways he’s wrong about it, including that he thinks he knows better what projects should go ahead for the good of the nation than the multi-year reviews conducted by the National Energy Board and the federal cabinet.<\/p>\n TRANS MOUNTAIN II<\/strong><\/p>\n Kinder Morgan has said it will not spend any more money on the Trans Mountain pipeline<\/a> expansion until Prime Minister Trudeau steps in to settle the Alberta-B.C. dispute. Geoffrey Morgan<\/a> reports that the company said that, before proceeding, it needs certainty it won’t face even more delays from B.C. The reputational damage from this fight will only exacerbate the exodus of big financing from Canada, said Canadian Energy Pipeline Association president Chris Bloomer.<\/p>\n TESTING, TESTING<\/strong><\/p>\n Mark Zuckerberg was in Washington yesterday (and today and tomorrow), where he said Facebook is testing a \u201cView Ads\u201d function<\/a>, which is only available to Canadians for now, James McLeod<\/a> reports. Facebook has “built a tool that lets anyone see all of the ads a page is running. We\u2019re testing this in Canada now and we\u2019ll launch it globally this summer,\u201d Zuckerberg said in his remarks. \u201cWe\u2019re also creating a searchable archive of past political ads.\u201d<\/p>\n MORTGAGE MODIFICATIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n Financial institutions responding to a Bank of Canada quarterly survey \u2014 in particular for its new household segment \u2014 reported that the new \u201cB-20\u201d mortgage standards<\/a> have had some impact since they came into effect in January, particularly when it comes to \u201cnon-price\u201d conditions such as minimum payments and credit limits. Geoff Zochodne<\/a> reports that overall household lending conditions tightened in the first quarter, as did prices (driven by higher interest rates), but non-mortgage lending was stable. However, BofC and some financial institutions have said it’s too early to tell what the effect will end up being. <\/p>\n