Here's my summary of the key issues from overnight that affect New Zealand, with news other than about the local 1080 poisoning threat.
American wholesale inventories unexpectedly rose in January as wholesale sales recorded their biggest decline since 2009, pushing the number of months it would take to clear stocks to its highest level in more than 5½ years.
Meanwhile, job openings rose in January in the US.
The Europeans have taken the art of can-kicking - first exhibited by the US Congress - to a new level overnight. For the third time since 2009 they have extended France's deadline to get its budget deficit below 3% of GDP as required by EU law. France plays by different rules.
The pace of Chinese inflation unexpectedly picked up in February to +1.4%, but producer prices continued to slide, underscoring the intense pressure on profit margins at Chinese companies and adding urgency to policymakers' efforts to find new ways to support growth.
This inflation news comes as the number of new jobs created in urban China slowed sharply in the first two months of this year, and the same survey suggested little likelihood of a pickup in hiring.
The UST 10yr yields continued their correction in New York earlier today and are now another -7 bps to 2.13%. Local wholesale rates fell -2 bps yesterday. Fear of the impact of the ECB bond buying program seems to be behind the shifts.
The crude oil price was fairly stable overnight and is now just on US$49/barrel but the Brent crude price fell and is now at US$57/barrel.
The gold price also fell, down $9/oz to US$1,157/oz.
The New Zealand dollar starts today having fallen away significantly against the US dollar on the 'eco-terrorism' threat and is now at 72.7 US¢ which is a further 1¢ fall, it is at 95.4 AU¢, and the TWI is down to 77.8. The 1080 impact on the NZD has now passed; the stronger USD is having the dominant impact. The kiwi dollar is now down more than 3¢ in a week.
If you want to catch up with all the local changes yesterday, we have an update here.
The easiest place to stay up with event risk is by following our Economic Calendar here »
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9 Comments
Stephen H: dairy led desecration of NZ 's water ways. A sweeping generalisation that doesn't reflect the reality at catchment level. Each catchment has it's own issues and not every catchment has the same one.
For mitigation measures to be effective in reducing nutrient loads, it’s important that they be adopted by sheep, beef and dairy farms. Sheep and beef farms remain the dominant land use by area in Southland. However, losses from dairy farms are greater per hectare. Overall the losses from both farm types are significant.
http://www.es.govt.nz/media/39171/mitigating_on-farm_losses.pdf
"France plays by different rules." So true.
Absence of rule of law and treaties would be enough for me as an investor to be very cautious about putting money into Europe. Coz who knows which law the EU is going to bend, twist and break next in order to finance French, Italian and Greek laziness?
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