The unemployment rate rose to 6.5% in September, in line with estimates…

… but for different reasons, as 68K of job losses split evenly between full and part-time work came in well below expectations for a small gain…

… and wiped out the gains made so far in 2026. At the sector level, losses were driven by the fourth month of public sector outflows - with education and health care contributing 58K in September…

… while the provincial trends continue, with losses concentrated in Ontario, Quebec, and BC partly offset by gains in Alberta.

The labour market softness has been masked by our aging population, which has pushed the participation rate to 64.8% - the lowest since 1997…

… which raises the bar for BoC rate hikes despite inflationary pressures. Let’s see what happens at the end of the month.

Gabe put out a great piece recently that digs into the Project Generation (PG) business of Altius Minerals (ALS), which is responsible (directly or indirectly) for the company’s large and growing royalty portfolio today…

… but started out of necessity, with a need to spread out its 1997 IPO proceeds of $480K. The three-person team is responsible for staking claims, vending projects out to partners, and managing the associated royalties/equity stakes…

… in the context of the market, which shows up as land accumulation in down markets, royalty creation and equity stakes during recoveries, and the monetization of those interests when conditions get frothy.

Through 2026, the PG team has been active on royalty creation…

… which shifts the capital-intensive exploration work to the partner, while Altius retains exposure through a royalty stake and minority equity position…

… which can be opportunistically monetized to fund PG’s operations…

… with the occasional home run like Arthur Gold funding Altius-level initiatives, which netted the company $64M and US$275M across two separate transactions - part of which was rolled into its $520M LRC deal.

While wins like that are huge for Altius, they’re small to its large cap royalty peers…

… which limits sophisticated competition alongside investor pressure to run a pure-play model - outside noise that Altius is immune to as a founder-led company.

Enerflex (EFX) rallied 14% today on a >1GW contract win to support a data center project - which comes two weeks after a 450 MW deal, takes the backlog to >1.75 GW, and drives continued growth in North America…

… which has a rapidly building backlog, underpinned by a 7 GW opportunity pipeline for distributed power applications.

The big win is supported by the company’s $100M of planned investment in facilities and capabilities…

… and the resulting growth in its Engineered Systems installed base creates a funnel into its higher margin, more stable aftermarket services business…

… which investors are beginning to price in, with the multiple sitting two turns above average - reflecting increased confidence in EFX’s data center opportunity.

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