Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today.
TODAY'S MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
No more changes to mortgage rates today, but check back later; Friday night is a popular time to announce them.
TODAY'S DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
ICBC changed a whole range of term deposit rates today, some up, some down.
CLIENTS [NOT] FIRST
An NZIER report has been released exposing the level of commissions being paid in the life insurance industry and it is an eye-opener. Much of the premiums you pay for cover are really just being used to pay the broker you used to buy the cover. In fact, nearly a quarter of what you pay compensates the brokers. NZIER suggested that these levels are excessive. This will not come as welcome news for the industry (or even Sovereign who commissioned the report) who are trying to hold back a worldwide regulatory tide that has turned against using commissions because they are distorting and gaming what is best for clients.
FEW UP SIGNALS
Today's USDA dairy price review reveals little change from two weeks ago. We have another GlobalDairyTrade auction due next Wednesday and although the futures market does not suggest much upward price change can be expected we need to remember the futures market price indications have been getting to be a less reliable predictor of auction price movements.
HIGHER, BUT NOT ALL IT SEEMS
Core retail spending volumes rose a moderate +1% in the March quarter, despite a cheaper fuel bill leaving more cash behind in household wallets. Twelve of the 15 retail industries had higher sales in the latest quarter. However, there was a large fall in fuel retailing, down almost -5% which was price driven. In actual terms, the value of total retail sales was $20.2 bln in the March 2016 quarter, up +4.7% from the March 2015 quarter. Eleven of the 15 industries surveyed had higher sales volumes with the largest increases in: electrical and electronic goods retailing – up almost 4%, and on-line shopping with domestic businesses up +10%. However Infometrics noted that even though the core increases are double the decade average, "when we factor in the increasing size of the consumer base (due to high net migration and tourist arrivals) it appears that individual households are still very restrained in their spending".
FMA WINS IMPORTANT CASE
Today the Court of Appeal overturned a High Court judgment that allowed the Luigi Wewege associated Vivier and Company to remain on NZ's financial service providers register. The FMA can now de-register dodgy institutions that don't actually do any business locally.
WIDE BOYS RESCUE GOLD
The new supply of gold into the market is facing headwinds because demand from jewellery, bullion investors, and industrial use is turning soft. Even third world central bank buying is softening. The only thing holding up demand in the first quarter of 2016 was a sudden spike by ETF funds, a demand source that is famously volatile. The data is from the World Gold Council report out overnight.
SWAP RATE RISES SLOW
For a third day in a row swap rates have risen, but today the rises were the smallest of the three. They are up +1 and +2 bps across the curve today. NZ swap rates are here. The 90-day bank bill rate is unchanged at 2.35%.
NZ DOLLAR UNCHANGED
We are back in an in-range holding pattern with very little net movement today. The Kiwi dollar is now at 68 USc, up to 93.2 AUc, and 59.8 euro cents. The TWI-5 is now at 71.6. Check our real-time charts here.
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18 Comments
The new supply of gold into the market is facing headwinds because demand from jewellery, bullion investors, and industrial use is turning soft. Even third world central bank buying is softening. The only thing holding up demand in the first quarter of 2016 was a sudden spike by ETF funds, a demand source that is famously volatile.
And probably very liquid with some very professional participants if the iShares iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bond ETF–better known as HYG is a comparable example. Read more
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=116…
Co-op bank CEO supports DTI rules.
because his competition wont do it, and so by them not joining in he would lose business and profits.
the beauty of the free market would suggest just let them go and one or two of the banks would fall by the way side if a correction happens.
BUT no government will allow that due to the carnage it would cause hence why they regulate or step in
Greed and profit
Check out this podcast. Although I am not one for conspiracy theories this is good
[Self Made Man] Confessions of An Economic Hitman?
http://podplayer.net/#/?id=14302914 via @PodcastAddict
Relates to the following book :
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_of_an_Economic_Hit_Man
Corporations changed in 1976 when Milton Friedman said Corporations goal was to maximise profits. What we need is for the goal of corporations to be to serve us the public. Yes make a reasonable return however profit should not me the main driver. Public interest should be. In NZ the govt is serving the large corporations over and over again... such as the banks etc. 8% lending growth and 216bn debt. As a percentage of gdp in a crowd with Spain and a Ireland. World's highest prices relative to incomes. Still no action against investor demand. Disgraceful
In 1967, the CIA Created the Label "Conspiracy Theorists" ... to Attack Anyone Who Challenges the "Official" Narrative
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-02-23/1967-he-cia-created-phrase-con…
Zerohedge as a source?: that's classic and circular !
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-29/unmasking-the-men-behind-zero-hedge-wall-street-s-renegade-blog
Check out Faceache features...no seriously, do not pull faces, get with the program
They are the new MSM, but with an agenda, all of their own making. Believe it or not.?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-05-12/leaked-facebook-training-manua…
And these guy's have arrived in NZ
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/20/harlequin-ladybirds-…
None of it will matter soon. Planetary Meltdown is accelerating at a phenomenal rate.
https://ads.nipr.ac.jp/vishop/vishop-extent.html
Driven mostly by atmospheric CO2, of course, which is 'going through the roof'.
Daily CO2
May 12, 2016: 408.34 ppm
May 12, 2015: 403.52 ppm
Up 4.82 ppm (versus 2005 - 2014 average of 2.11 ppm per annum)
AFKTT, I'm always interested in the information you produce, but think I must take issue with your assertion that 'none of it will matter soon'. This, it seems to me, is to preach either a grab it while you can, end-of-time philosophy, or a do-nothing, failure-accepting defeatism. Both of these, I submit, are unreasonable and dangerous, and neither are true to the capabilities of the human spirit.
Granted, we face immense global difficulties, immense challenges to our continuance, but our choices include seeking to address and rise to these, not just that of accepting a squalid fatalism. As a parent, I can say that our children utterly reject any prognosis of hopelessness - whatever forms their future lives and environments may take - and neither would I counsel them into despondent resignation.
Human life - all life - does matter. Things are getting better and worse at the same time. It is up to us to choose which side we are on.
I have never advocated doing nothing to prevent planetary meltdown. In fact, I spent more than 20 years raising the issues relating to planetary meltdown (including 5 books, television interviews, radio etc.) and did my utmost to prevent it, commencing when atmospheric CO2 was around 360 ppm and it would have been possible to do something. .
Unfortunately, we live in a corrupt society, in which vested interests manipulated the general populace into thinking that environmental collapse was so far into the future it was not worth thinking about or that governmental agencies had everything under control (when in fact they didn't have anything under control and were actually promoting policies that made everything worse faster:). It was not difficult to manipulate the general populace when we lived (and still live) in a society in which most people are scientifically illiterate. Couple that will massive investments made by energy companies, such as Exxon, into climate disinformation:
'Exxon knew of climate change in 1981, email says – but it funded deniers for 27 more years'
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/08/exxon-climate-change…
and the UNIPCC using redundant information to generate optimistic projections and we see why we are in the dire situation we are in now.
In practice there are still strategies that could be adopted to reduce the pace of meltdown, such as;
1.an immediate severe reduction in speed limits followed by a ban on the manufacture of private motor vehicles.
2. closing down the tourism sector
3. banning the advertisement of non-essential goods and services
4. stopping the importation of Chinese-made inflatable Santas, Halloween costumes, leaf blowers etc.
....and dozens of others.
Well, we know that NONE of those strategies will EVER be adopted because they would impinge of the banking sector, the corporate sector and retail sector etc., and would be 'bad for economic growth'.
Therefore, everything that matters WILL be made rapidly worse until the economic system implodes via energy depletion and environmental collapse, or via political factors.
Just when collapse will occur cannot be exactly is determined (too many unknowns) but all the evidence indicates it will be before 2025 because atmospheric CO2 will have broken through 450 ppm (up 220 ppm from the historic average and up 170 ppm from the pre-industrial norm of 280 ppm) by then = a hothouse world with rapidly rising sea levels and goodness knows what else.. Emeritus professor Guy McPherson is convinced positive feedbacks will result in extinction of the human species by 2030.
http://guymcpherson.com/climate-chaos/climate-change-summary-and-update/
I believe it will take a little longer.
However, should all the Arctic sea ice melt this year, a completely new global climate regime will be established very soon because the lack of ice will result in a greater amount if energy being absorbed by the water (that was previously covered in ice) and that lack of ice will result in zero latent heat if phase change and even faster warming.
None of what I have written is what people want to hear. It just happens to be scientifically factual.
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