about 0. 2 percentage points in 2020. in sum, the canadian economy is currently facing some headwinds, but there is good reason to believe that the economy will accelerate in the second half of this year. in this context, the bank ’ s governing council judges that an accommodative policy interest rate continues to be warranted. we will continue to evaluate the appropriate degree of monetary policy accommodation as new data arrive. in particular, we are monitoring developments in household spending, oil markets and global trade policy to gauge the extent to which the factors weighing on growth and the inflation outlook are dissipating. with that, senior deputy wilkins and i would be happy to take your questions. 2 / 2 bis central bankers'speeches

in the level of settlement balances, all other things being equal. fluctuations can also occur due to differences in the timing and size of our asset purchases versus the relatively lumpy maturities of our legacy asset holdings. we will aim to minimize fluctuations in order to keep settlement balances in the range but, on rare occasions, we may not always be able to for a day or so. - 7while our core objective is to supply enough settlement balances in the financial system for us to be able to implement our monetary policy effectively, that ’ s not our only consideration. another important factor is market discipline, given that we are also responsible for promoting a stable and efficient financial system. what do i mean by this? well, we don ’ t want to see major banks and other core financial institutions under - investing in their capacity to robustly manage their liquidity because they have developed an unhealthy over - reliance on settlement balances. in managing their liquidity needs, financial market participants should be able to respond to fluctuations in those needs in other ways — for example, through access to markets. going forward, our assessment of the optimal range of settlement balances will account for the evolving nature of both payments and the financial system, as well as the need to maintain market discipline. the return to business - as - usual balance sheet management okay, so what will business - as - usual look like after qt ends? under our normal course of balance sheet management, we buy assets on a passive basis to reflect the autonomous rise in our liabilities. traditionally, the biggest liability has been currency in circulation. demand for cash usually grows at roughly the same speed as the nominal growth of the economy. i want to be clear, though, that while qt is almost finished, the composition of our asset holdings won ’ t be back to normal for quite some time. as i explained in my speech last march, we want to restore a more balanced mix of assets with a broader range of maturities — including more short - term assets — than we hold now. currently, our asset portfolio is made up almost entirely of goc bonds. and as a result, our asset holdings have a maturity profile that skews longer than it did before the pandemic. going forward, we will hold not only goc bonds but also goc treasury bills ( t - bills ) and term repos, just as we did before the pandemic. in steady state, we will aim