How big is Vancouver’s bubble?

A weekly roundup of news and views on money, markets, the economy and more

Vancouver’s housing-bubble risk is unmatched on the planet, according to a report released this week by Swiss bank UBS. The rise in Vancouver’s average housing prices compared with the growth in average wages, rents and other economic factors make it the most likely to experience a sudden downward correction compared with 17 other large cities around the globe. The UBS Global Real Estate Bubble Index finds bubble risk is also high in London, Stockholm, Sydney, Munich and Hong Kong, while homes in Singapore, Boston, New York and Milan are fairly valued. Last year, in its first such report, UBS rated Vancouver fourth behind London, Hong Kong and Sydney. (CBC)  

UBC’s Sauder School of Business is launching the Western Canadian version of the Creative Destruction Lab, a successful seed-stage program based at University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, to help high-technology ventures driven by university research maximize their commercial impact and benefit to society. CDL uses a goal-setting model to push ventures along a path toward success. Over nine months, the G7, a collective of leading entrepreneurs with experience building and scaling technology companies sets targets for ventures to hit every eight weeks. The CDL-West G7 will include Jeff Mallett, founding president, COO and director of Yahoo! Inc. from 1995-2002. (UBC

A new daily has dawned on Vancouver Island. On Tuesday, Black Press launched the Vancouver Island Free Daily in print, on the net and as a new app available to both iPhone and Android users. The Daily will provide readers with a wide range of Island, provincial, national and international news and sports coverage. Helming the Daily’s news team are Philip Wolf and John McKinley, a pair of veteran Island-born, Island-raised journalists with a combined 50 years of experience reporting on Island people and issues. (Nanaimo Bulletin

Worried about how many times your personal information has been exposed to hackers? You should be. At least 500 million Yahoo users had their information stolen in 2014, the company said recently—a year when half of American adults had their personal information exposed to hackers. Take The New York Times interactive quiz to find out which parts of your identity may have been stolen in some of the major hacking attacks in the last three years and what you can do about it. (The New York Times

The secret world of wealth managers: their job is to protect clients’ money from risk. They know more about their clients than the clients’ own wives. They are loyal in the face of appalling behaviour. They are the brains behind the most ingenious tax avoidance schemes. And there are more of them than ever. (The Guardian