MORTGAGE GROWTH AT 17 YEAR LOW

   Mortgage growth has shrunk to a 17-year low in Canada, increasing pressure on the country’s big banks to find business elsewhere.
  Residential mortgage growth rose 3.1 per cent to $1.55 trillion in December from a year earlier, the slowest pace since May 2001, and half the growth rate from two years ago, according to data from the Bank of Canada.
   “The bread-and-butter of profitability for Canadian banks — is going to have a little less butter on the bread,” said Craig Fehr, investment strategist at Edward Jones & Co., whose firm oversees $30.8 billion in Canada. “That is, in many cases, the largest and most profitable and steady of the businesses that these banks operate.”