Executive Summary: Past 10 Days

• TTCD has been rising, not falling: latest quoted level was 411.22, up +0.31% on the day, with a 52-week high of 423.67.
• Exact 10-trading-day return was not available from the accessible data, but Barchart shows +1.12% over 5 days and +3.04% over 20 days, so the 10-day move likely sits between those unless there was a sharp single-day reversal.
• The move appears driven by large constituents, especially Dollarama, Restaurant Brands, Magna, Aritzia, and Canadian Tire, which TMX lists among TTCD’s major holdings.
• Aritzia has been a major positive fundamental driver: Q4 fiscal 2026 revenue rose 32.6% YoY, comparable sales rose 27.7%, and U.S. revenue rose 37.8%.
• The index is still below its recent high: 411.22 vs 423.67, about 2.9% below the 52-week high.

Key Drivers

1. Consumer discretionary sentiment improved

TTCD benefits when investors become more comfortable with Canadian consumer spending, retail earnings, and rate-sensitive cyclicals. The recent move looks like a risk-on / consumer resilience trade, rather than a defensive sector rotation.

2. Aritzia strength helped sentiment

Aritzia’s latest reported quarter was very strong: net revenue +32.6% YoY, comparable sales +27.7%, digital revenue +29.2%, and U.S. revenue +37.8%. That supports the view that higher-quality discretionary retailers can still grow despite tariff and consumer pressure.

3. Canadian Tire showed “resilient but selective” consumer behaviour

Canadian Tire’s Q1 showed revenue +3.3%, retail revenue +2.9%, and EPS of C$2.02 versus C$0.67 a year earlier, but comparable sales were still down 1.0%. That is mixed: supportive for earnings quality, but not a broad spending boom.

4. Technical position is constructive but not overextended

Measure	Reading	Interpretation
Last price	411.22	Near upper range
5-day change	+1.12%	Short-term upward momentum
20-day change	+3.04%	Broader 1-month recovery
9-day RSI	59.73	Positive, not extreme
14-day RSI	58.43	Momentum supportive, not overbought
9-day ATR	1.55%	Normal short-term volatility

Source: Barchart technical table.

Interpretation

TTCD’s recent strength looks like a controlled advance, not a blow-off rally. The index is above its short-term moving average and showing positive 5-day and 20-day performance, but RSI near 58–60 suggests momentum is healthy rather than stretched.

The main reason: investors are rewarding selective consumer strength. Aritzia is showing exceptional growth, Canadian Tire is showing resilience but mixed same-store sales, and larger holdings like Dollarama and Restaurant Brands add quality/defensive-growth characteristics inside a discretionary index.

Risks

• Tariffs / input costs: Aritzia itself flagged tariff impact and de minimis changes, even while margins improved.
• Consumer slowdown: Canadian Tire’s comparable sales decline shows consumers remain selective.
• Auto exposure: Magna adds cyclical and tariff-sensitive auto exposure to TTCD.
• Index near resistance: TTCD is still below the 423.67 high; failure near that level would suggest the rally is losing breadth.

Scenarios

Scenario	What happens next	TTCD implication
Bull	Retail earnings stay strong, rates ease, consumer spending holds	Retest of 423–424 area
Base	Mixed earnings, selective spending, no major macro shock	Range trade around 405–415
Bear	Consumer data weakens, tariffs pressure margins, auto stocks lag	Pullback toward 399–405 support zone

Actionable Takeaways

TTCD’s past 10-day movement is best explained as positive sector rotation into higher-quality consumer names, supported by strong Aritzia results and resilient Canadian Tire data. The short-term trend is constructive, but the index is close enough to its recent high that confirmation requires a move above the 423–424 zone.

Canada’s main stock index rose on Friday as higher ⁠gold prices ​boosted metal mining shares, but gains for the index were kept in check as investors worried about the inflationary impact of the AI boom. Wall Street ended mixed.

The Toronto Stock Exchange’s S&P/TSX Composite Index ended up 129.79 ​points, or 0.4%, at 34,980.00. For ‌the week, the index added 0.4%.

The materials sector, ⁠which includes metal miners, was up 1%. It was the ⁠second straight day of gains for the sector after it traded near the ​bottom of its range this year on Wednesday.

The price of gold rose 1% as the U.S. dollar gave back some of its recent gains.

Technology added 1.2%, with shares of e-commerce company Shopify Inc adding 4.6%. Industrials were up 0.7%, while real estate ended 1.6% higher. The two most heavily ⁠weighted sectors edged lower. Financials lost 0.2% ​and energy was down 0.3%.

The price of oil settled 3.7% ⁠lower at $69.23 a barrel, adding to its steep weekly decline, as as oil tankers kept exiting the ‌Strait of Hormuz, easing supply concerns.

The TSX was headed for ​a 6.8% gain in the second quarter, which would be its eighth straight quarterly advance.

Domestic data was downbeat, with a preliminary report showing that wholesale trade fell 0.7% in May ​from April.

On Wall Street, the S&P 500 ended marginally lower, with a steep drop in AI-related chip stocks and sharp gains in Moderna and other healthcare stocks.

The PHLX chip index tumbled 5.3%, underscoring recent volatility among AI-related chipmakers that have fueled ⁠much of Wall ​Street’s gains in recent years. While some investors remain optimistic about the potential for AI to fuel higher profits, others worry that massive spending to build AI data centers may take too long to pay off.

“It’s too early to conclude that there’s a major correction brewing in tech, but what I would say is ​that the questions around profitability and the capex story are certainly not ‌going away,” said David Stubbs, chief investment strategist at AlphaCore Wealth Advisory.

Stubbs also warned that Wall Street could be vulnerable to signs that U.S. companies may not be able to deliver on investors’ high earnings expectations. Apple rallied 3.1% and partly rebounded from a selloff on Thursday, when it raised iPad and MacBook prices, blaming soaring memory and storage chip costs.

Moderna surged almost 13% to ‌its highest level since ​2024 after the drug developer ‌hosted an investor event and showcased its pipeline.

Eight of the 11 S&P 500 sector indexes declined, led lower by ​industrials, down 3.41%, followed by a 2.45% loss in materials. U.S. inflation rose ⁠above 4% in May, data showed on Thursday, as the Iran war drove up energy ⁠prices, keeping alive the possibility of a Fed rate hike.

While oil prices have retreated sharply as the Middle East tensions eased, Apple’s newly ​announced price hikes suggest inflation remains a concern, said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at B. Riley Wealth.

“We saw a similar dynamic during the pandemic, when supply chain disruptions limited access to semiconductors. Now, we’re witnessing a comparable supply shock, this time driven by memory, which is creating renewed inflationary pressure,” Hogan said.

The S&P 500 declined 0.05% to end the session at 7,353.95 points. The Nasdaq declined 0.24% ⁠to 25,297.62 points, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 0.09% to 51,876.11 points.

For the week, the S&P 500 fell 2.05% and the Nasdaq lost 4.7%.

The chip index lost 7.9% for the week, its worst week since early April. A report that OpenAI was considering delaying its public debut until next year also weighed on risk sentiment related to AI stocks.

Shares of SpaceX edged up 0.15%. Passively managed index funds need to buy billions of dollars’ ⁠worth of the stock ahead of its inclusion in Russell indexes.

Meanwhile, interest ​rate concerns persisted, with traders pricing in one 25 basis-point rate hike and a near 27% chance of another by ⁠year-end, according to LSEG-compiled data.

A survey showed U.S. consumer sentiment rebounded from record lows in June, though households remained worried about the high cost of ‌living.

ON Semiconductor dropped almost 24% after agreeing to acquire Synaptics in an all-stock deal valued at about $7 billion. Synaptics dipped ​3.7%.

Advancing issues outnumbered falling ones within the S&P 500 by a 1.8-to-one ratio. The S&P 500 posted 35 new highs and 5 new lows; the Nasdaq recorded 263 new highs and 169 new lows. Volume on U.S. exchanges was relatively heavy, with 30.1 billion shares traded, compared with an average of 23.1 ​billion shares over the previous 20 sessions.

Reuters, Globe staff

WINNIPEG – The head of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights says it’s unfortunate a trustee resigned over an exhibit about displaced Palestinians but she stands by the decision for it to open to the public Saturday.

The exhibit, titled “Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present,” focuses on people affected by the Nakba, Arabic for catastrophe. About 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced in 1948 during fighting over control of what is now Israel.

The exhibit has been in the works for four years, though Palestinian Canadians have been calling for their stories to be told at the Winnipeg museum since it opened in 2014.

Jewish groups have raised concerns that the exhibit could fuel antisemitism by not providing more historical context and that it was created without sufficient consultation and transparency.

Board member Mark Berlin submitted his resignation earlier this week, accusing the museum of putting forth ideology instead of an accurate history.

“It’s unfortunate that (Berlin) chose to resign based on his opinions about this exhibit and what he knew of it,” Isha Khan, the museum’s chief executive officer, said Friday.

“Board governance is intended to manage different opinions and make decisions that are from the best interests of this museum and to ensure that we deliver our mandate. I believe that’s what our board has done — supported this museum to do the work to deliver our mandate.”

Berlin, who hadn’t seen the exhibit before resigning, said it didn’t acknowledge the estimated 850,000 Jewish people who were forced to flee Arab countries in the years following the establishment of Israel.

He said presenting the Palestinian displacement of 1948 without proper historical and political context can deepen the distrust and animosity that exist between Jews and Muslims in Canada. 

Khan said stories of Palestinian Canadians have been underrepresented in the museum’s galleries.

She said she has heard criticism from people and groups who haven’t yet seen the Nakba exhibit and challenged them to view it with compassion and empathy. 

“Sharing the experiences of one community doesn’t diminish or negate the experience of another,”

Khan said the museum has committed to telling stories about Jewish displacement in the future. And she encouraged those critical of the exhibit to step into the space first. 

“Then we can have some constructive discussion about what it is and what their concerns might be. To this point, many of those concerns were based on what it could be and fear.”

The museum invited media to view the exhibit Friday.

Taking up about 12 metres of an existing gallery, it includes video testimonies, photographs, art and writings. Property deeds, house keys and deep red embroidered clothing are also among featured artifacts.

Short videos on a small screen share first-hand accounts of Palestinian Canadians displaced in 1948.

Isabelle Masson, curator of the exhibit, spoke with about 10 Palestinian Canadians in Winnipeg and Montreal for the project. 

She said their stories helped the team understand the historical impacts of displacement and highlighted the hope of Palestinians.   

“The exhibition holds stories about this intergenerational trauma, about loss and uprooting, but also stories about beauty, cultural practice and art.”

Fouad Sahyoun was four when his family was displaced from Haifa in what is now known as Israel. He settled in Canada in 1990. 

Portions of an interview with the 82-year-old are featured. He talks about how his grandfather’s properties were seized, along with the family’s cars, bank accounts and furniture. 

In an interview with The Canadian Press, The 82-year-old said he dreams of one day returning to Haifa as a Palestinian citizen.

“We live under trauma, and that trauma will only end when we’re allowed to go back as decent people, as human people, in our homes and properties.”

Sahyoun hopes the exhibit educates others to, “know our story, know what we went through.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 26, 2026.

Oct. 7: Hamas terrorists burst through border, slaughter Israelis in their homes

At least 300 killed, 1,590 injured, hostages taken in multi-pronged infiltration from Gaza, as terrorists attack civilians, soldiers at 22 sites; thousands of rockets fired at Israel

Canada’s financial consumer watchdog says the Royal Bank of Canada RY-T -0.81%decrease was fined more than $4-million for providing inaccurate credit card statements to some customers.

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada says it issued a fine of $4.25-million in March, which the bank paid in April.

It says RBC provided credit card statements with wrong information about amounts credited or charged between 2001 and 2024. 

The agency says a total of 227,947 accounts were affected and that RBC transferred and refunded more than $22.4-million. 

Nathaniel Wallace, a spokesperson for RBC, says the lender takes its regulatory obligations seriously. 

He says RBC self-reported the matter to the financial consumer watchdog and that RBC has fully co-operated with the regulator throughout the process. 

SU.TO (Suncor Energy) maintains a strong positive correlation with WTI crude oil prices over the past 6 months (and historically), as is typical for this major integrated Canadian oil producer with significant upstream exposure.

Recent Historical Overview (approx. Dec 2025 – June 25, 2026)

• SU.TO (TSX, CAD): Traded in the $50s–$60s earlier in the period, rallied strongly with oil (peaking near $90–$96 in spring/early May 2026), then declined sharply in May–June amid falling oil. Recent closes: ~$77–$80 (e.g., ~$77.49–$77.55 on June 24–25, 2026).
• WTI (USD/bbl): Peaked higher (around $90–$100+ in spring) before declining to the ~$70–$72 range recently (e.g., front-month futures around $71–$72 on June 25, 2026).

Both moved directionally together, with SU.TO gaining from higher realizations (and downstream refining providing some buffer) but pulling back with the recent oil weakness.

Correlation

• Strong positive correlation: Historical analyses (multi-year) show Pearson correlations of ~0.58–0.64 between SU and WTI/Brent, meaning oil explains a substantial portion (~34–41% via r²) of SU price variance.
• In the recent 6-month period, the linkage remained evident in the co-movement during the spring rally and subsequent decline. Other factors (CAD/USD FX, refining margins, costs, company ops, broader markets) moderate the relationship. Suncor’s integrated model (oil sands production + refining) offers some resilience compared to pure upstream peers.

Sensitivity Context

• A ~US$1/bbl change in WTI can impact Suncor’s adjusted funds from operations (AFFO) by roughly $200 million annually (per older guidance; scales with production).
• Breakeven WTI has improved significantly (low $40s in some reports), supporting resilience.

3-Month Forecast Scenarios (from late June 2026 baseline)

Current baselines: SU.TO ~$77–$78 CAD; WTI ~$71–$72/bbl.

• +5% WTI scenario (~$3.55–$3.60 increase → ~$74.5–$75.6/bbl): Positive support for SU.TO. Given the correlation/sensitivity, expect ~3–8% upside (rough estimate; not 1:1 due to hedging, FX, margins, duration of move, and sentiment). This suggests a potential range of ~$80–$84 over 3 months (base case). Stronger sustained recovery + positive catalysts could push toward $85+. Analyst targets (broader 12-month) are higher, often in the $90s–$100+ CAD.
• -5% WTI scenario (~$3.55–$3.60 decrease → ~$67.5–$68.5/bbl): Downward pressure. Similar magnitude sensitivity implies ~3–8% downside, pointing to a potential range of ~$71–$75. Deeper or prolonged weakness (below key thresholds) could pressure cash flow, buybacks, and sentiment more, though Suncor’s lower breakeven and downstream help cushion.

Key caveats:

1. Not linear or guaranteed: Short-term moves can overshoot; longer-term depends on production, costs, WCS differentials, refining cracks, CAD strength (currently ~1.42 USD/CAD), geopolitics, OPEC+, demand, and macro factors.
2. Volatility is high in energy. Analyst consensus targets for SU.TO remain constructive overall but vary.
3. Overall: Strong historical tie to WTI supports upside in the +5% case and risk in the -5% case, with Suncor’s fundamentals providing a reasonable buffer.

• The core personal consumption expenditures price index showed a 3.4% annual rate after rising 0.3% for the month. The core annual reading was the highest since October 2023.
• The Fed’s primary inflation gauge also showed an annual rate of 4.1%, the highest since April 2023.
• Even with the elevated inflation levels, consumer spending for the month came in stronger than expected. Personal consumption expenditures rose 0.7% for the month.
• Also, gross domestic product, the broadest measure of growth, rose at a seasonally adjusted annualized pace of 2.1% in the first quarter, up 0.5 percentage point from the prior reading.

The Federal Reserve’s primary price gauge rose at its highest level since 2023, reinforcing the central bank’s recent tough talk on inflation.

Excluding food and energy, the personal consumption expenditures price index showed a 3.4% annual rate after rising 0.3% for the month, both in line with the Dow Jones consensus. The annual core reading was the highest since October 2023.

For the all-items reading, the PCE index showed inflation running at a seasonally adjusted 4.1% annual rate, the highest since April 2023, according to a Commerce Department report Thursday. On a monthly basis, the PCE accelerated 0.4%. The annual level was in line with the Dow Jones consensus estimate while the monthly reading was 0.1 percentage point below.

While Fed officials look at both headline and core rates, they generally consider the latter a better measure of long-run trends, particularly in light of this year’s inflation surge that was driven largely by an acceleration in energy prices tied to the Iran war that have slowly been seeping into other parts of the economy.

Stock market futures held in positive territory following the release while Treasury yields slipped. Traders continued to expect the Fed to approve a rate hike in September, though they lowered odds slightly.

Energy again provided the largest source of price gains, with related goods and services prices up 4% for the month. Housing cost rose 0.3%, while financial services and insurance jumped 1.2%.

“Inflation is at a 3-year high due to the war in Iran and it’s painful for middle-class and moderate-income Americans,” said Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union. “People are spending more on gas, along with healthcare and utilities. New Fed Chair Kevin Warsh has made his commitment clear to bring inflation down. The key will be how much relief happens by September.”

Even with the elevated inflation levels, consumer spending for the month came in stronger than expected.

Personal consumption expenditures, a proxy for spending, rose 0.7% for the month, 0.1 percentage point above the forecast and ahead of the inflation rate. Personal income also climbed 0.7%, well above the 0.4% forecast. The personal saving rate rose to 3%.

A shopper looks at a fresh vegetable display June 4, 2026 at the Market 32 Supermarket in South Burlington, Vermont.

Robert Nickelsberg | Getty Images

The report comes a little more than a week after the Fed and Warsh delivered what markets widely viewed as a tough talk on rates and inflation.

Warsh in particular stressed the importance of price stability, with the Federal Open Market Committee adopting language in its post-meeting statement unequivocally stating that it would “deliver price stability” after missing its 2% inflation target for five years running. In addition, officials took off a previously indicated rate cut this year and indicated a likelihood of a hike.

However, the inflation picture has been complicated. Fed officials generally look through the kind of supply-driven spike that the energy surge has driven, but concerns are rising that price increases are becoming more widespread and also are being fed by tariffs.

Multiple Fed officials dissented at the April meeting because the statement had included “forward guidance” that titled toward further cuts coming, and that language was removed from last week’s statement.

Other data released Thursday shows the economy in a relatively strong position.

Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of growth, rose at a seasonally adjusted annualized pace of 2.1% in the first quarter, according to the last of three readings. That was up from the prior indication of 1.6% and better than the forecast for 1.7%. The Commerce Department said the change largely reflected a downward revision to imports, which subtract from GDP.

Also, initial jobless claims fell to 215,000 for the week ended June 20, down 12,000 from the prior reading and better than the estimate for 223,000.

Canadian convenience store operator Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc. ATD-T tallied its best U.S. same-store sales growth of the last three years during its latest quarter, a sign consumer confidence is slowly returning in its biggest market as the company also surprised investors with major gains in U.S. gasoline profit margins.

Its shares hit a new all-time high, closing the day at $91.87 on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The company now has a market value of $75.5-billion.

Couche-Tard, which owns the Circle K chain, reported a 3.4-per-cent, year-over-year increase in merchandise sales at comparable U.S. stores during its latest three-month period. Store traffic increased and customers snapped up more packaged beverages, nicotine products and food than in the previous quarter, and the company said it continued to take share from rivals.

Meanwhile, Couche-Tard’s profit margins on gasoline sold in the U.S. hit a five-year high, even as it sold two per cent less fuel at comparable stores.

Stifel analyst Martin Landry said the company was able to use arbitrage strategies to take advantage of volatile crude oil prices seen this year as a result of the war in the Middle East, tallying a US$0.52 per gallon margin during the quarter that outpaced the US$0.35 per gallon industry-wide average.

Both data points helped power Couche-Tard during the quarter ended April 26. Revenue came in at US$19.5-billion for the period, up 20 per cent from the US$16.3-billion last year. Net earnings were US$863.3-million, including a gain on the settlement of a long-standing legal battle over interchange fees. On an adjusted basis, profit was US$667-million or US$0.73 per share, easily beating the average analyst estimate of US$0.54.

“We see better traffic, margin expansion and a more productive network, while we continue to invest in the capabilities that will extend these advantages over time,” Couche-Tard chief executive Alex Miller told analysts on a call Tuesday. “And importantly, our fuel platform continues to perform as our teams lean into the strength and agility of our supply chain and global scale to capture opportunities and grow market share.”

After a solid trajectory of profit growth over the past two decades, Couche-Tard’s business has come under pressure more recently as consumers cut spending to deal with higher levels of debt as well as inflation. Global conflict, including in Ukraine and the Middle East, has added to those worries as retail industry observers analyze whether it will lead to any lasting change in consumer behaviour.

Many of those consumers now appear to be shaking off the bad news, at least south of the border. Others might simply be responding to what Circle K has to offer, including $3 meal deals. With its latest earnings report, Couche-Tard tallied same-store sales growth in the U.S. for the fourth consecutive quarter.

Mr. Miller launched a new five-year strategy in February that builds on Circle K’s traditional strengths in selling fuel, nicotine products and drinks. With the push, Couche-Tard has said it expects it can generate year-over-year adjusted earnings-per-share growth of 10 per cent or more from fiscal 2026 through 2030.

“We believe this quarter demonstrates more proof” that profit growth level can be achieved, Scotiabank analyst John Zamparo said in a note to clients. The company’s earnings beat this quarter “reveals the strength of its fuel business, which is probably more durable than investors give it credit for,” he said.

Couche-Tard has built up its global fuel business over the past decade and now runs that unit from logistics hubs in Houston and Geneva, Switzerland. The company sold 15.4-billion gallons of gasoline and diesel in fiscal 2025, operates a fleet of about 575 trucks, and owns several fuel terminals. It recently bought three terminals in Germany to add to its supply capabilities.

This scale gives the company options on where to source fuel when supply gets squeezed, as it has in recent months. Said Mr. Miller: “It’s about recognizing various markets, how those markets receive product, what options are there to supply those markets, and building those options so that when you need them or when opportunity exists, you can take advantage of that.”

AtkinsRéalis Group Inc. ATRL-T +0.60%increase has launched efforts to license its Candu reactor in the United States, an opening salvo into a market that has traditionally been regarded as off-limits to foreign vendors.

The Montreal-based company submitted a notice to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, or NRC, Tuesday morning, beginning the process to obtain a license for its Enhanced Candu 6, or EC6, reactor.

The application arrives at a moment when the U.S. government is working to discourage imports of many Canadian products including cars, steel and aluminum through tariffs and other measures. Yet AtkinsRéalis could benefit from a drive by U.S. President Donald Trump to reorganize the NRC with the explicit goal of speeding up licence applications for commercial nuclear power plants.

AtkinsRéalis is applying under a new streamlined process, known as Part 53, which compels the NRC to decide on granting licences for commercial power plants within 18 months. That deadline was imposed by an executive order Mr. Trump signed last May, which also demanded “wholesale revision” of the NRC’s regulations and large reductions in its staffing to remedy what he regarded as overzealous oversight.

Nuclear strategy raises questions about Canada’s predilection for Candu

The EC6 is an updated, 730-megawatt version of a 1970s-era reactor that was exported to Argentina, Romania, Korea and China. Because it’s not a first-of-a-kind reactor, and because it completed a prelicensing review by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission more than a decade ago, the company hopes the NRC might license the EC6 even more quickly.

“We’re shooting for 12 months,” said Joe St. Julian, president of AtkinsRéalis’s nuclear business.

The U.S. has traditionally been regarded as a difficult market for foreign reactor vendors to crack. Nearly all of the more than 130 reactors built in the U.S. decades ago used technology from four domestic vendors; most were boiling water reactors and pressurized water reactors, technologies the Americans also exported worldwide.

Partly for this reason, Mr. St. Julian said, AtkinsRéalis dedicated few of its marketing efforts to the country in recent years. But the company sensed an opening after Mr. Trump’s May, 2025, order, which demanded the NRC facilitate the expansion of U.S. nuclear generating capacity four-fold by mid-century, implying that hundreds of large new reactors are needed.

Mr. St. Julian said that only one U.S. vendor offers large reactors: Westinghouse Electric Co., which markets a large reactor known as the AP1000. He’s betting Westinghouse lacks adequate resources to build hundreds of them.

“The U.S. does not have the capacity to do that any more, given the fact that their entire nuclear industry has atrophied over 30 years.”

According to reports, the Trump Administration has opened talks with other foreign vendors, including South Korean diplomats representing Korea Electric Power Corp. Mr. St. Julian said AtkinsRéalis has been in talks with the NRC for more than a year, and the U.S. federal government has encouraged its application.

“We’re not sure how this is going to play out, but all signs and all dialog have been very encouraging for us to actually go there.”

AtkinsRéalis is also developing an updated version of its 1980s-era Candu 850 reactor, dubbed the Monark, which has a planned capacity of 925 megawatts. Mr. St. Julian said the company intends to seek an NRC licence for that reactor once it has completed licensing with the NRC’s counterpart in Canada, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

Federal plan aims to boost nuclear sector with up to 10 new reactors, expand international footprint

Canada’s nuclear industry previously made forays into the U.S., with little success.

Decades ago, Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., or AECL, (a Crown corporation and the predecessor of AtkinsRéalis’s nuclear division) designed a reactor known as the Candu 3U for the U.S. market, but it was never built or sold.

AECLmarketed another product known as the Advanced Candu Reactor 700 south of the border in the early 2000s. Intending to make a more compact, cheaper version of the Candu 6, AECL planned to use slightly enriched uranium fuel and light water as a coolant. It formed a partnership with a major American utility, Dominion Energy D-N +0.34%increase, to explore the possibility of building the reactor, and sought to license from the NRC beginning in 2002.

The NRC, though, advised that AECL would have to resolve a variety of technical issues to satisfy its concerns.

“The staff expects that the review and evaluation of the ACR-700 design will be more challenging, will involve expenditure of more resources, and may take longer to review than a typical light-water design,” it warned in a letter to the company in 2004, estimating the certification process could take longer than 60 months.

Shortly afterward, Dominion dissolved the partnership, citing concerns about how long the NRC review would take.

The NRC has since acknowledged that its regulatory framework was tailored to the American-designed light water reactors it was familiar with, and has cast Part 53 as a remedy. (Critics have made similar complaints about Canada’s regulatory framework, which evolved largely with a focus on the heavy water Candu technology.)

The drive to speed up NRC licensing decisions has worried some critics.

In a commentary published in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists last July, former NRC chairs Stephen Burns, Allison Macfarlane and Michard Meserve warned that the Trump administration had undermined its previous status as an independent regulator free from industry and political influence, and that its new licensing deadlines were “arbitrary.”

“We are concerned about the unintended safety consequences that a reduced NRC independence and a schedule-driven regulatory paradigm threaten to bring,” they wrote.

Saskatchewan uranium miner Cameco Corp. CCO-T -1.97%decrease is cheering the U.S. Department of Energy’s announcement of a conditional US$17.5-billion loan package to speed up new reactor builds.

The department’s Office of Energy Dominance Financing says the loans are for five eligible projects – each with two reactors – sponsored by utilities and energy companies across the U.S.

The goal is to quickly deploy 10 large-scale commercial reactors by providing financing for components that take a long time to manufacture and deliver.

The only licensed large-scale advanced commercial reactors operating in the United States currently are Westinghouse Electric Co.’s AP1000 units.

Saskatoon-based Cameco and Brookfield Asset Management BAM-T -1.98%decrease together own Westinghouse.

Cameco says certain technical, legal, environmental and financial conditions must be met before the Department of Energy enters into definitive financing documents and funds the loans.

Just over a year ago, U.S. President Donald Trump signed executive orders with the goal of quadrupling domestic production of nuclear power within the next 25 years.

“When combined with the May 23, 2025 executive orders and other U.S. government initiatives, we believe the right incentives are being created to advance the rapid deployment of AP1000 reactors in the U.S.,” Cameco CEO Tim Gitzel said in a news release Tuesday.

“The expansion of nuclear power in the United States is expected to create significant opportunities for Westinghouse and Cameco, accelerating growth in Westinghouse’s energy systems segment during the procurement and subsequent construction phase.”

The Department of Energy says each project will be jointly owned by Westinghouse and a utility or energy company partner. Both parties are required to fully commit their project equity – US$500 million each – upfront before accessing loan funds.

Each of the reactors would generate 1.1 gigawatts of power, with the combined output enough for almost 10 million households, the Department of Energy said.

“These conditional loans will play an important role in reviving the supply chain needed for America to once again build large-scale commercial reactors,” U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said in a news release.

“They will also help accelerate the timeline of building those large-scale reactors by up to three years, lowering construction costs and ensuring the United States is able to deliver on President Trump’s bold and ambitious energy addition agenda.”