From Acuras to iPhone apps, suits to sweet potatoes, Canadians are going to be paying more for imported goods, thanks to the loonie's fall against the U.S. dollar.
"It's down roughly 10% from a year ago. That's a very deep decline in a relatively short period of time." says Douglas Porter, chief economist and managing director of BMO Financial Group.
And consumers, Porter says, will pay the price.
It's already happening
Food prices have been increasing for months. Clothing, while often made overseas, tends to be priced in U.S. dollars and has also been getting more expensive.
So too a big-ticket item that Canadians are buying in record numbers. Automakers have started to raise sticker prices on Canadian vehicles.
The Automobile Protection Association says Toyota and Honda, among others, raised prices in the first week of January. Several luxury brands, including Lexus, Acura, and BMW have also made changes to their pricing, with Audi reportedly set to follow in mid-January, the association says.
The APA says most of the increases are modest, an extra few hundred dollars per vehicle.
But it says Honda has raised the suggested retail price on its 2015 CRV Touring, all-wheel-drive model by $750.
Last week, Apple raised prices in its Canadian App Store. The 99-cent apps will now cost $1.19 Canadian, a 20% increase. Other apps under $10 went up by about 15%. Apple says the increase is linked to the exchange rate.
But it's not all bad news. The loonie isn't the only currency falling against the greenback.
But with the U.S. accounting for about half of all Canadian merchandise imports, the dollar's doldrums will hit most Canadian consumers in the pocketbook.
