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A review of things you need to know before you go home on Tuesday; SBS cuts TD rates, inflation expectations fall, 'hot' regional expansion, big Auckland re-zoning, swaps lower, NZD falls

A review of things you need to know before you go home on Tuesday; SBS cuts TD rates, inflation expectations fall, 'hot' regional expansion, big Auckland re-zoning, swaps lower, NZD falls
For Tuesday, February 23, 2015. <a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/">Image sourced from Shutterstock.com</a>

Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today.

TODAY'S MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
There have been no home loan rate changes today.

TODAY'S DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
SBS Bank cut TD rates for terms 6 months to 3 years by -10 to -20 bps.

EXPECTING MORE
Low actual inflation for a long time is changing business inflation expectations. In today's RBNZ surveys, companies believe inflation in two years will be +1.8%, down +0.5% for the survey results a year ago. Households currently think inflation is running at +2.0% (its actually at +0.8% pa), and they think in a year's time it will be +2.5%. In five years they think it will be +5.0%. What do you think? Markets were surprised at both survey results and have marked down the NZD.

EVERYONE IS BENEFITING
Todays release by the ANZ economics team of their regional economic reports painted a positive picture of broad expansion. "Twelve of fourteen regions recorded an increase in economic activity in the December quarter. That’s a broad based economic expansion in operation. The Bay of Plenty, Hawkes Bay and Waikato led the charge. Auckland was mid-pack in both the December quarter and annual growth stakes. It’s doing well but it’s not the pace-setter. Likewise with Canterbury. New Zealand’s economic expansion is broader than those regions alone."

ANOTHER 650
Auckland Council has approved a re-zoning and resource consent for the development of 31 hectares in the Whenuapai Village Special Housing Area, paving the way for more than 650 new homes. The land was zoned ‘future urban’ which prevented immediate development.  The new zoning, ‘mixed housing suburban’, which was approved within 101 working days of the application being lodged by Oyster Capital, means sections and homes can now be built.

RELATED PARTY DEBT REMISSION RULES
An officials’ issues paper released today seeks feedback on proposed changes to make the debt remission rules more certain for taxpayers. For more information see the media statement and the issues paper, Related parties debt remission. The closing date for submissions is 14 April 2015.

WHOLESALE RATES FALL
Following the lead from benchmark rates in New York earlier today, our swap rates are down -1 to -4 bps across the curve in a flattening bias. It turned out that local pressures were not enough to overcome the international influence. The 90 day bank bill rate is up +1 bp to 3.63%.

NZ DOLLAR DROPS
Check our real-time charts here. There was an exchange rate reaction to the RBNZ inflation survey knocking off some of the rises that took place earlier in the day. We are now at 74.9 USc, at 96.2 AUc , and the TWI is at 78.3.

You can now see an animation of this chart. Click on it, or click here.

Daily exchange rates

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Daily benchmark rate
Source: RBNZ
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Source: RBNZ
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Source: RBNZ
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Source: RBNZ
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Source: RBNZ
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Source: RBNZ
End of day UTC
Source: CoinDesk

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3 Comments

But, but, but where are the interest rate hikes?   So strongly predicted for the last 6 years.  

When will the bank economists/commentators explain why they ignored global conditions, refused to accept the new normal, refused to acknowledge the reality of the GFC, and stubbornly refused to admit that what happens in Europe, USA and Australia etc will eventually have an effect on the NZ economic environment?   Were they trying to dampen down the size of new mortgages for safety reasons?   We're they trying to encourage more fixing to lock in customers?   

 

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Well said. My thoughts exactly. How could  NZ keep racking up interest rates when the rest of the world was going the other way? The rock from the rock star  economy has been dropped overboard. 

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Maybe Super City Len should buy one or two of these.

 

http://sourceable.net/3d-printing-used-produce-multi-storey-buildings/#

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