The federal fiscal year month by month: the path to the 2025-26 in-year deficit, and its reconciliation to the published annual statement
The same fiscal year, read two ways by the same source. Statistics Canada's table 10-10-0133-01 redistributes the Department of Finance's monthly financial data -- the cube's own footnote reads, verbatim, 'Source: Department of Finance Canada.' and 'Monthly financial data is unaudited.' -- so the twelve monthly budgetary balances of fiscal 2025-26 can be summed and set against the annual figure the Fiscal Monitor publishes for the same year. This entry pins the monthly path, the annual totals it sums to, the single month that carries most of it, and the composition line where the two presentations differ, each from its own archived source bytes. It states what the record shows about how a federal fiscal year accumulates; it does not forecast, and it does not treat an unaudited in-year figure as a settled outcome.
A Resolution record holds one institution's own published figures for a single, specific quantity — a projection, an estimate, or a measured record — across every vintage in which that institution restated it. Each time an issuer publishes a new budget, report, or release, an earlier figure does not disappear from the record; it is preserved exactly as it was first published, dated and cited, alongside the newer one. What is a Resolution record? →
Maintained record. This lineage preserves an official record version by version — observations, estimates, or benchmarks its issuer restated over time. It projects nothing, so no settlement is pending; where a figure can still be revised, the page says so. How the numbers moved between versions is the evidence this lineage exists to keep.
The lineage
| Vintage | Issuer | Published | Position | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Statistics Canada | 2026-07-26 | current | Source → · accessed 2026-07-26 |
| March 2026 edition (the twelfth and final monthly edition covering fiscal 2025-26) | Department of Finance Canada | 2026-06-15 | current | Source → · accessed 2026-07-20 |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Statistics Canada | 2026-07-26 | current | Source → · accessed 2026-07-26 |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Statistics Canada | 2026-07-26 | current | Source → · accessed 2026-07-26 |
| March 2026 edition (the twelfth and final monthly edition covering fiscal 2025-26) | Department of Finance Canada | 2026-06-15 | current | Source → · accessed 2026-07-20 |
| Vintage | Period | Value | Role | Assurance | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Fiscal 2025-26 (April 2025 through March 2026), twelve monthly observations summed | -55,277.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | March 2026 alone (the final month of fiscal 2025-26) | -29,727.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | April 2025 through February 2026, the eleven months before the fiscal year's last | -25,550.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Fiscal 2025-26 public debt charges, twelve monthly observations summed | 53,707.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Fiscal 2025-26 program expenses, twelve monthly observations summed | 501,588.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| March 2026 edition (the twelfth and final monthly edition covering fiscal 2025-26) | Fiscal 2025-26 program expenses excluding net actuarial losses, as published | 487,892.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| March 2026 edition (the twelfth and final monthly edition covering fiscal 2025-26) | Fiscal 2025-26 net actuarial losses, as published | 13,695.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | Fiscal 2024-25 (April 2024 through March 2025), twelve monthly observations summed | -43,154.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
| The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) | March 2025 alone (the final month of fiscal 2024-25) | -23,880.0 CAD millions | preliminary observation | unaudited | as first published |
Movement between vintages
A record, not a ranking: this entry states what was published and how it compares to what followed. It never says who was right, which institution performed better, or grades a forecaster's competence.
| Comparison | Compared vintages | Movement | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fiscal 2025-26: the final month set beside the eleven months before it | The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) (preliminary observation -25,550.0 CAD millions) vs. The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) (preliminary observation -29,727.0 CAD millions) | not comparable — The horizons differ by construction -- one month against eleven -- so the two figures are complements that add to the year, not measures of the same thing on the same span. The numeric difference is carried because it is arithmetic on one series, and the pair is presented as a decomposition of the twelve-month total rather than as a comparison of like with like. | same issuer |
| Fiscal 2025-26 program expenses: the monthly series summed, against the Fiscal Monitor's published presentation | March 2026 edition (the twelfth and final monthly edition covering fiscal 2025-26) (preliminary observation 487,892.0 CAD millions) vs. The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) (preliminary observation 501,588.0 CAD millions) | +13,696.0 CAD millions | same issuer |
| The final month's share of its own fiscal year, 2024-25 and 2025-26 | The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) (preliminary observation -23,880.0 CAD millions) vs. The series as published at capture, reference periods 2009-04 through 2026-03 (204 monthly observations) (preliminary observation -29,727.0 CAD millions) | -5,847.0 CAD millions | same issuer |
Evidence qualifications (5)
- Every figure in this entry is unaudited. The source cube says so in its own footnote, and the Fiscal Monitor's HTML page says so in its own words. The audited outcome for fiscal 2025-26 is the Public Accounts of Canada, which had not been tabled when this entry was registered.
- The monthly series restates its own recent history. The cube's footnote states that changes in accounting policies, methodologies for estimating monthly balances, and the classification of balances between financial components are applied retroactively to monthly results for the fiscal year immediately preceding. No vintage archive of this series is published by anyone, so a figure pinned here cannot later be compared against what the same series said today unless these bytes are kept -- which is why they are archived with their hash.
- The monthly sums are addition and nothing else. No seasonal adjustment, annualisation, interpolation, or estimation is applied at any point. Where a sum differs from a published annual figure by one million dollars, the residual is the rounding carried by monthly values each stated to the nearest million, and it is reported rather than absorbed.
- March's share of the year is a property of the record, not an explanation of it. Federal accounts recognise year-end accruals, valuation adjustments, and other amounts in the final month; the record shows the concentration and does not attribute it to any spending decision, policy, or department.
- The 10-10-0133-01 program-expenses member and the Fiscal Monitor's 'program expenses, excluding net actuarial losses' are different lines. They are reconciled here explicitly rather than presented as alternatives, and neither is restated into the other's form.
Related on this site
- Big Question: Does the federal budget land where it was promised? →
- Brief: Where the budget lands: the federal fiscal position, the promises against it, and what the audited record settles →
- Receipt: Evidence summary for Where the budget lands: the federal fiscal position, the promises against it, and what the audited record settles →
- Domain: Federal Fiscal Capacity →
- More Resolution lineages →
- Sources & Method →
A record, not a ranking: this entry states what was published and how it compares to what followed. It never says who was right, which institution performed better, or grades a forecaster's competence.
This is the current public record for this lineage. See Work with Countability for a commissioned projection-resolution question.
Work with Countability