TORONTO \u2014 As Canadian businesses grapple with the latest flare up in U.S. trade tensions, executives at Scotiabank still see the trade situation as \u201cmanageable\u201d for the domestic economy\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fundamentals in Canada are pretty good, if you look at the job growth numbers, if you look at the fiscal capacity on the back of oil prices, and if you look at some of the activity that\u2019s starting because of the prime minister\u2019s agenda, you actually have a backdrop that\u2019s pretty good,\u201d Scotiabank chief executive Scott Thomson said on the bank\u2019s third-quarter earnings call on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
U.S. President Donald Trump imposed 50 per cent tariffs on about $28 billion worth of Canadian products over the weekend after trade talks collapsed.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The federal government, meanwhile, announced Tuesday its own suite of retaliatory dollar-for-dollar tariffs on American goods, which are set to take effect Sept. 8. That includes upping tariffs on American steel and aluminum products from 25 to 50 per cent and imposing other levies on clothing, appliances, dairy products and more. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Thomson said the new U.S. tariffs affect about five per cent of Canada\u2019s exports and will have a small impact on gross domestic product.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis obviously creates uncertainty, but with the current tariffs it\u2019s manageable,\u201d he said on the conference call, which occurred before the federal government\u2019s counter-tariff and support measures announcement.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe should use this as a country, use this moment to accelerate further the prime minister\u2019s agenda, removing interprovincial trade barriers, reducing the timing of approvals, getting big things done and continuing to diversify trade, while also continuing the great trade relationship we have with the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Mark Carney\u2019s economic agenda includes plans to invest in infrastructure to boost trade, while diversifying away from the U.S. The strategy has also involved setting up a major projects office to speed up reviews of nation-building projects and boosting the country\u2019s defence capabilities.<\/p>\n
Thomson sees potential growth across infrastructure, pipelines and defence. He added that the evolving relationship with the U.S. presents a chance to focus on small business and commercial clients.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI do see the opportunity for more capital to be deployed, frankly across all of our business,\u201d Thomson said. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Scotiabank reported a third-quarter profit of $2.95 billion, up from $2.53 billion a year ago.<\/p>\n
The bank said Tuesday the profit amounted to $2.27 per diluted share for the quarter ended July 31, up from $1.84 per diluted share in the same quarter last year.<\/p>\n
On an adjusted basis, Scotiabank says it earned $2.28 per diluted share in its latest quarter, up from an adjusted profit of $1.88 per diluted share a year earlier.<\/p>\n
Revenue for the quarter totalled $10.54 billion in its third quarter, up from $9.49 billion in the same quarter last year.<\/p>\n
Analysts on average had expected an adjusted profit of $2.10 per share and $9.99 billion in revenue, according to LSEG Data & Analytics.<\/p>\n
Scotiabank\u2019s provision for credit losses for the quarter amounted to $1.08 billion, up from $1.04 billion a year ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cQ3 was a record quarter for the bank, as all business lines reported strong results and we exceeded our medium-term objectives in the period,\u201d Thomson said in a statement.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn particular, we exceeded our 14 per cent return on equity target this quarter, highlighting the improvements that we have made across the bank to increase margins and fee income.\u201d<\/p>\n
John Aiken, an analyst at Jefferies, said in a note to investors that Scotia\u2019s third quarter was an \u201cimpressive beat against expectations.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThat said, much of the heavy lifting was done by a surprisingly strong capital markets performance. Consequently, while we anticipate that Scotia\u2019s results will be viewed positively by the market, we do not expect that the full eight per cent beat will be automatically priced into its valuation,\u201d the note reads.<\/p>\n
Scotiabank said its Canadian banking business earned a profit attributable to equity holders of $1.07 billion, up from $958 million a year ago, boosted by higher revenues, partly offset by higher non-interest expenses and provision for credit losses.<\/p>\n
The bank\u2019s international banking operations earned $725 million attributable to equity holders, up from $670 million in the same quarter last year.<\/p>\n
Scotiabank\u2019s global wealth management business earned $515 million attributable to equity holders, up from $417 million a year ago, while its global banking and markets business earned $647 million in its latest quarter, up from $473 million in the same quarter last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
—<\/p>\n
Daniel Johnson, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 25, 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO \u2014 As Canadian businesses grapple with the latest flare up in U.S. trade tensions, executives at Scotiabank…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":871095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[4498,45,49,48,133],"class_list":["post-871094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-banks","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-finance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/871094","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=871094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/871094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/871095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=871094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=871094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=871094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}