Maple & Bay

Topic

CUSMA

Analysis of the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, the 2026 joint review, and what's at stake for Canadian exporters.

1 IssueRSS for CUSMA

Orientation

CUSMA is the 2018 successor to NAFTA and the legal architecture under which roughly $1.5 trillion in annual trilateral trade moves. It includes a sunset clause: if the three governments do not jointly extend it at the 2026 review, the agreement enters a sixteen-year wind-down. The review window is the most consequential trade-policy event for Canada in the post-NAFTA era.

Key numbers
U.S. FDI stock in Canada, end-2024
$684B CAD
Canada-U.S. two-way auto trade, 2024
~$160B CAD
Regional value content threshold for autos
75%
Joint review deadline
July 1, 2026
Primary sources
Related explainers
Coverage
May 4
Issue 1

Checkpoint or Cliff? The Real Cost of a CUSMA Failure

A failure to extend CUSMA on July 1 does not end the agreement overnight, but it triggers a decade of annual-review uncertainty that changes the calculus on every cross-border investment decision. The automotive rules of origin question is the one most likely to move markets; any signal on an agreed regional value content threshold is the most important economic data point before July 1, 2026.