Trump says Canada's Golden Dome membership costs $61 billion — or free as 51st state
Within hours of Canada's sovereignty being made abundantly clear by its King in a historic and symbolic speech from the throne in the nation's capital, U.S. President Donald Trump once again made a pitch for Canada to become the 51st state.
Article content
In a post to Truth Social, he said the cost to join in the 'fabulous Golden Dome System' — the multilayered missile defence program to counter foreign threats to America, even those coming from space — would be US$61 billion should Canada choose to remain 'a separate, but unequal, Nation.'
Article content
But join the U.S. as its 'cherished 51st state' and protection from the defence program will cost Canada 'zero dollars.'
Article content
'They are considering the offer,' Trump wrote.
Article content
Article content
Prime Minister Mark Carney's office didn't say whether it received such an offer when contacted by National Post, but said discussions on NORAD and the Golden Dome have been part of 'wide-ranging and constructive discussions' Carney and his ministers have had with U.S. counterparts.
Article content
But while acting on his citizen-driven mandate to establish a new relationship with the U.S., his office said, 'the Prime Minister has been clear at every opportunity, including in his conversations with President Trump, that Canada is an independent, sovereign nation, and it will remain one.'
Article content
National Post has contacted the White House press secretary and is awaiting a response.
Article content
The president first announced the Golden Dome initiative in the Oval Office last week, remarking during his address and in questioning from reporters that 'Canada wants to be part of it' and will 'pay their fair share.'
Article content
'We are dealing with them on pricing,' he said.
Article content
Article content
In a statement to the Canadian Press at the time, a spokesperson for the prime minister confirmed talks on the Golden Dome, but didn't share costs or specifics.
Article content
Article content
The project has already been awarded its first $25 billion with the passage of Trump's 'One Big Beautiful Bill Act' — legislation that covers reforms in several sectors, including defence.
Article content
Article content
Carney has made multiple commitments on defence spending, the most recent being in Tuesday's throne speech, which confirmed Canada would join ReArm Europe, the European Commissions's plan to give member nations more 'financial flexibility' to mobilize a combined 800 billion euros (CAD$1.25 trillion) for a 'massive ramp-up of defence spending.'
Article content
As part of a pledge that Canada would hit NATO's defence spending target of two per cent of gross GDP by 2030, the Liberals' election platform included $130 billion in new defence spending over the next four years.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Winnipeg Free Press
25 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Premiers huddle with Carney in Saskatoon to decide what major projects to prioritize
SASKATOON – Canada's premiers are meeting with Prime Minister Mark Carney in person for the first time since the federal election to pitch which major projects they think should get fast tracked. The recent campaign saw Carney vow to slash federal approval times on major infrastructure projects considered to be in the national interest to help make the country an 'energy superpower.' The full list of big industrial projects they're discussing is being kept secret, since they don't want to send a bad signal about anything that doesn't make the short list. But Ontario Premier Doug Ford says his pick is the Ring of Fire mining project in northern Ontario, while Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says she wants to see the Port of Prince Rupert become a major trade corridor. The first ministers are also expected to discuss breaking down interprovincial trade barriers, which would make it easier to purchase Canadian-made goods from other provinces and territories. Many provinces, including Quebec and Ontario, are coming to the table with legislation already put forward that would eliminate some of these longstanding blocks to internal trade. — With files from Rob Drinkwater in Edmonton This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 2, 2025.
Calgary Herald
28 minutes ago
- Calgary Herald
Carney and premiers meet to talk fast-tracking national interest projects
SASKATOON, Sask. — Prime Minister Mark Carney will meet with premiers in Saskatoon today to discuss efforts to knock down trade barriers and fast-track projects deemed as benefiting the national interest. Article content Article content Carney had asked the 13 provincial and territorial leaders to come up with major infrastructure and energy projects that could be fast-tracked for approvals under a new federal process. Article content Article content The premiers will spend part of Monday's meeting receiving an overview of the proposed process set to be introduced through legislation by the end of June. Article content Article content Under the proposed bill, details of which were shared for consultation with First Nations groups, including the Assembly of First Nations, the federal Liberal government would establish a major projects office through which selected proposals would flow for approvals. Article content The proposed legislation would allow projects to be deemed as carrying national significance to be exempt from certain steps of the existing approvals process. Article content Carney has promised to shrink the timeframe for approvals of major infrastructure and energy projects to two years, down from five. Article content But which projects could make the list is what the premiers are looking to hear from Carney and that will be the topic of discussion when the leaders meet behind closed doors. Article content Article content Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has said an oil pipeline from Alberta to British Columbia's coast 'must be on the initial list.' Article content Should it not be, it would not only send a bad signal to investors, but also 'send an unwelcome signal to Albertans concerned about Ottawa's commitment to national security,' she wrote in a letter to Carney on May 16, which her office released last Saturday. Article content Separatist sentiments have been rising in both Alberta and Saskatchewan. Article content For his part, Carney has said he wants Canada to become an 'energy superpower.' Article content As he meets with premiers, he faces calls from the CEOs of major Canadian energy companies, as well as Smith and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe, to scrap policies critics say are hostile to pipeline development, such as the tanker ban off the coast of northern British Columbia and the Impact Assessment Act.
CBC
29 minutes ago
- CBC
ETFs are outpacing mutual funds despite market volatility. Are rookie retail investors at risk?
Canadian investors are putting more of their money into exchange-traded funds (ETFs), according to recent data, even as the U.S.-led trade war rocks global stock markets, and some experts say rookie retail investors are at higher risk. Net sales of exchange-traded funds — a basket of stocks that can be bought and sold throughout the trading day — are outpacing those of mutual funds in Canada, especially among retail investors, according to a CIBC report published earlier this month. Mutual funds, which are sturdier investment products that have more embedded fees and fewer tax advantages, still make up a larger portion of Canadian investment portfolios. They're usually actively managed by a professional and are exposed to fewer intraday market swings because they're traded once per day after market close. Yet ETFs have grown at three times the rate of their older cousins in the last five years, signalling a shift in how both retail investors and professionals are approaching their investment strategies. Sales for both dropped dramatically in 2022, at the onset of the inflation crisis. "People have been disappointed with [mutual fund] performance for a long time, and historically, most people have had more investments in mutual funds than in ETFs," said Dan Hallett, a Windsor, Ont.,-based vice president of research for Highview Financial Group. "More people are paying attention to the costs that are embedded in their investments and the ETF structure is generally a lower-cost vehicle than a mutual fund, particularly on the retail side," he said. "But it's also happening at the advisory level." In fact, ETF assets (the value of all the equities and cash held in the funds) reached an all-time high of $518 billion in 2024, a report from the Investment Funds Institute of Canada shows. Those assets have ballooned by nearly seven times in the last decade. Retail investors are contributing heavily to that growth, both reports say, as more people opt to take their investments into their own hands rather than pay a professional financial adviser the fees to manage their portfolios. But there are concerns about risk. South Korea, worried about rookie retail investors who are buying exchange-traded products (including ETFs) by leveraging debt, has introduced a one-hour mandated training for those who manage their own investments. Impact on investor outcomes In the U.S., investment management company Vanguard's VOO has become one of the world's best-selling ETFs by bundling the highest performing stocks from the S&P 500 index. The company's own risk scale, which measures the likelihood of losing money on an investment, puts the VOO at a risk level of four out of five, for products that are "broadly diversified but are subject to wide fluctuations in share prices." It recommends it for long-term investors. Sal D'Angelo, the head of product at Vanguard Canada, says there are a few reasons why ETF uptake has grown substantially in the last several years. Both retail investors and professional portfolio managers are moving to lower-cost options; There's more interest in indexing, which is a passive investment strategy that matches an index's best-performing stocks, rather than trying to beat the index's growth; and there are more retail investors buying ETFs in general. WATCH | What the bond market selloff means: How the U.S. bond market made Trump blink | About That 1 month ago Duration 8:42 Vanguard Canada's version of the S&P 500 ETF is listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the VFV ticker. It boasted an annual return of 35.24 per cent last year and 23.3 per cent in 2023. This year, in the wake of a tariff-induced roller-coaster market environment, the ETF is showing a year-to-date loss of -3.07 per cent. D'Angelo argues that ETFs work well in these conditions because of their flexibility. "ETFs as a vehicle, I think, work really well in volatile markets because they have that immediate liquidity if you do want to trade," he said. Others say that the influx of investors buying ETFs under volatile market conditions poses some concerns. "It's concerning to me in terms of the impact on investor outcomes," said Hallett. He thinks the same factors that left some investors disappointed in mutual funds could eventually afflict ETFs, too. "When you have investors that are trying to build a portfolio and they're bombarded with almost a dizzying array of choices, only the most disciplined and knowledgeable investors will benefit from that and can easily sift through it," he said. "Everybody else is going to get very distracted," Hallett said, "and that's where you end up with a disappointing performance." Massive jump in April The data comes as a new generation of investors have game-ified day trading, buying and sell stocks at the drop of a hat from their phones and tablets. Automated tools — which let investors set trading parameters that are then executed by a bot, like selling a stock when it hits a certain price — are also seeing more frequent use. Tradeweb, a company which operates marketplaces for traders, saw an 83 per cent jump in the number of retail investors using automated tools to make trades in April compared to the same month a year earlier. "Something we haven't seen so prolifically in previous periods of market volatility is an increase in clients turning to automation," wrote Adam Gould, the global head of equities at Tradeweb. "However, in April, we saw investors using automated tools [to] enhance reactivity to a challenging trading landscape with greater speed of execution." Marius Zoican, an associate professor of finance at the University of Calgary, studies the gameification of investing and monitors retail investor behaviour. "If the market goes up five per cent within a day or drops five per cent intraday, and if you are holding ETFs and you are receiving these notifications, it's very tempting to act on them, even though those are about past performance," he said. "Once you're sort of nudged … into this idea that the market is going down, you're likely to just go on your phone and and sell. And that's perhaps not [the] optimal behaviour." He added that during highly volatile times, like the period we're currently in, ETFs can face a liquidity rush if too many people try to sell at the same time. "That might create a divergence between the price of the ETF and the price of the underlying basket," he explained, whereas mutual funds managed by a professional have more guardrails against impulsive investment behaviour. "When there's a lot of volatility, there are always additional risks for retail [investors], for small investors who may act impulsively."
