‘Data for Business’ is an effort of the Langley Chamber, in partnership with the Canadian Chamber’s Business Data Lab, to bring our members reports, stats, and analysis on economic and business data to help inform business and investment decisions. Read our latest update below:

The Langley Chamber is pleased to share the Q4 2025 Business Insights Quarterly, published by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, which is informed by the survey input of 10,000 businesses across the country. 
This latest Business Insights Quarterly, drawing on responses from more than 10,000 businesses in Statistics Canada’s Canadian Survey on Business Conditions, points to a Canadian economy that is losing momentum despite mixed headline indicators.

While GDP growth is holding, underlying drivers such as consumer spending and business investment are cooling, and business confidence remains below neutral, with profits, hiring expectations, and exporter sentiment under continued pressure. Trade uncertainty—particularly ongoing U.S. tariffs and an upcoming CUSMA review—has pushed many trade-exposed firms into a wait-and-see posture, with limited diversification or investment activity to date.

At the same time, labour market conditions are easing as job vacancies decline and private-sector hiring slows, masked in part by continued public-sector growth. The report also highlights gradual but cautious AI adoption, with firms using technology primarily to retool workflows and upskill employees rather than reduce headcounts.

Overall, the findings suggest businesses are adapting carefully in an environment defined by softer labour conditions, elevated trade uncertainty, and increasing pressure to invest in skills and productivity to remain competitive.

Key Findings:

• Business outlook
  • Growth is weakening beneath the surface: GDP avoids a technical recession, but momentum is soft as spending and investment stall. The economy is staying upright, but the next shock could tip it.
  • Confidence stays fragile: The Business Expectations Index remains below 100 and sentiment is uneven across regions. Firms are behaving defensively and not planning for growth.
  • Exporters are losing conviction: Exporter sentiment softens as businesses doubt a quick trade deal is within reach. Trade exposure has firmly emerged as a confidence anchor.

• Business Obstacles:
  • Demand uncertainty still dominates: Weak demand continues to outpace labour challenges as a top obstacle. The binding constraint is customers, not capacity.
  • Cost pressures not gone: Cooling inflation helps, yet businesses still flag cost-related frictions. Disinflation supports margins but doesn’t automatically restore growth.

• Inflation and Debt Constraints
  • Disinflation continues, but pricing pressure lingers: Headline improves while core steadiness and price-hike intentions keep policy “wait-and-see.” Rate relief likely to slow, and so businesses stay cautious.
  • Insolvencies remain elevated: Insolvencies stay above historic norms. Economic weakness is showing up in business exits, not just slower hiring.
  • Debt capacity is holding (unevenly): Nearly two-thirds say they can take on more debt if needed. Access isn’t the only issue, so are confidence and demand.


• Labour market
  • Softer conditions are becoming clearer: More job seekers and fewer openings point to easing tightness despite recent monthly “bounces.” Hiring power is shifting back toward employers.
  • Job growth is increasingly public-sector-led: Private sector hiring sputters while public sector growth carries more weight. Headline job gains may overstate underlying business momentum.
  • Shortages persist in specific sectors: People-facing industries still report labour challenges. Cooling is real but not evenly shared.


•  SMEs and trade 
  • Small firms remain more downbeat: Smaller firms extend “pre-trade war” pessimism relative to large firms. The confidence gap signals uneven resilience and planning capacity.
  • Large firms drive recent job creation: Despite SMEs making up most of the workforce, larger firms account for most recent gains. Growth is concentrated — policy and finance conditions matter for SMEs.
  • SME counts are stable, but composition is shifting: Active SMEs hold steadier than larger firms in recent trends. While SME survival has stabilized, scaling remains the goal and the challenge.
  • Tariff impacts are real and skew larger: Roughly one-third of trade-engaged firms report negative impacts; “major negative” rises for 100+ employee firms. The biggest exporters are absorbing the biggest policy risk.
  • Most firms are still sitting tight: “No action taken” is the most common response, especially among smaller firms — actions concentrate among larger businesses. Diversification may lag until uncertainty becomes unavoidable.
  • Price pass-through is a key pressure valve: Raising prices is among the more common responses. Tariff risk can show up as inflation pressure and weaker demand


• AI adoption
  • Canada’s AI adoption is rising but slowly: Actual adoption is tracking the slower scenario path. The competitiveness risk is falling behind peers, not moving too fast. Unlike hardware or LLMs, Canada could still win at adoption.AI is becoming a skills story: The education–AI relationship strengthened in 2025 — from moderate to strong. The payoff will concentrate where talent is and widen gaps where it isn’t. 
  • Use is broad, but advanced AI is clustered: Front-office tools are spreading; advanced applications remain concentrated in knowledge sectors (professional services, finance, information/culture). AI diffusion is happening, but frontier capability is still narrow.
  • Early signals say retooling is greater than retrenchment: Firms report workflow changes and training more than employment impacts. Industry patterns show no one-to one “AI up equals jobs down.” The immediate risk is adaptation capacity, not layoffs.
  • High-AI industries are still hiring, and youth employment is holding up there: Employment indices rise post-Gen AI period in these sectors. The transition so far looks like restructuring with continued entry points for youth.