{"id":574262,"date":"2026-04-01T03:04:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T03:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/574262\/"},"modified":"2026-04-01T03:04:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T03:04:10","slug":"ottawas-fiscal-year-shaping-up-better-than-budget-forecasts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/574262\/","title":{"rendered":"Ottawa&#8217;s fiscal year shaping up better than budget forecasts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"750\" height=\"563\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/800x600_parliamentottawa_ChristopheLedent_472209533-750x563-1.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Rideau Canal in Ottawa with view of Parliament buildings\" style=\"object-fit:cover;\"  \/>iStockphoto\/ChristopheLedent<\/p>\n<p>The federal government\u2019s annual deficit for the fiscal year ending today is tracking below Ottawa\u2019s own expectations set out the 2025 budget, despite increased spending.<\/p>\n<p>The fiscal monitor published last Friday showed Ottawa\u2019s deficit from April to January came in at $31.2 billion.<\/p>\n<p>With just two months left in the federal fiscal calendar, those levels are well below the $78.3 billion forecast for this year\u2019s annual deficit in the Liberal government\u2019s budget tabled last November.<\/p>\n<p>BMO chief economist Doug Porter says it would be dangerous to project where the federal government will end the fiscal year after just 10 months of results, given that March in particular usually sees a major spike in the deficit related to income\u00a0tax\u00a0payouts.<\/p>\n<p>Porter says he does expect the federal government will end the current fiscal year with a deficit below what it forecast in November, due in part to stronger government revenues and interest rates on debt that were lower than Ottawa first projected.<\/p>\n<p>The Liberals are expected to update their economic and fiscal projections later this spring but have not yet set a date to table the statement.<\/p>\n<p>\n                Subscribe to our newsletters\n            <\/p>\n<p>            <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"400\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/CdnPress_logo_400x400.png\" class=\"attachment-full size-full wp-post-image\" alt=\"The Canadian Press logo\" title=\"CdnPress_logo_400x400\"  \/>          <\/p>\n<p class=\"author__name\">Craig Lord, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n<p>Craig Lord is a reporter with The Canadian Press, a national news agency headquartered in Toronto and founded in 1917.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"iStockphoto\/ChristopheLedent The federal government\u2019s annual deficit for the fiscal year ending today is tracking below Ottawa\u2019s own expectations&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":574263,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194295],"tags":[105249,49,48,24691,20739],"class_list":{"0":"post-574262","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ottawa","8":"tag-budget-2025","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-deficit","12":"tag-ottawa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=574262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574262\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/574263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=574262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=574262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=574262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}