Here are five things you need to know this morning:
Boeing shares up on labour pact news: Shares in Boeing are up in premarket trading this morning after union workers hammered out a tentative agreement with the embattled aerospace giant that will raise their pay by 35 per cent over four years. The workers are set to vote to ratify the deal or not on Wednesday, the same day as the company posts quarterly results.
Spirit Airlines soars on debt extension: Shares in Spirit Airlines surged by as much at 70 per cent at one point premarket this morning after the carrier reached an agreement with its lenders to extend a deadline to either extend or refinance its 2025 bonds. A filing Friday means the airline now has until December 23 to come up with a plan or lose its ability to process credit card transactions – a death-knell for most businesses, especially an airline – or possibly face outright bankruptcy.
Feds set to hike pay grades for high-wage foreign workers: The federal government is poised to put new limits on its high-wage foreign labour program, Bloomberg is reporting this morning. The changes will mean that companies looking to hire workers from the high-wage stream of the Temporary Foreign Worker program will need to offer pay that’s at least 20 per cent higher than the median wage in every province. Previously they only had to offer the average wage after they could prove that it’s too hard to find Canadians who could do the work. The changes are part of the government’s attempts to curb population growth after years of it surging.
The night the lights went out in Cuba: Residents and businesses in Cuba have been mostly without power for more than two days now after a collapse of the grid on Friday was followed by the landfall of Hurricane Oscar yesterday. It’s hard to understate the impact of an entire country being effectively without power for days on end, but foreign companies with a presence in the area are taking action. TSX-listed miner Sherritt is among them, with the company saying its Moa Nickel mine is currently running at about 50 per cent capacity until full power is restored. In addition, the mine provided power to regional power stations to assist with restarting in anticipation of connecting and generating power back to the national grid, the company said in an operational update on Monday morning.
B.C. election as tight as can be: What a barnburner in British Columbia. A provincial election campaign that was fascinating at every step stayed true to form on election night, with the NDP seemingly holding on to power by the narrowest of margins, winning or ahead in 46 ridings. That’s enough to hold off the surging Conservatives, who seem to have won 45, two short of the 47 needed for a majority. As things stand, the Green Party and their two MPs may hold the balance of power, but the situation is still very much in flux. No matter how things shake out, the vote is already record-breaking as a total of 2,037,897 ballots were cast. That’s the highest number for a B.C. provincial election ever.