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Roger J Kerr says a lot of people will be asking whether our 'health first' strategy has delivered the results expected or did we get the balance between health and the economy somewhat skewed?

Currencies
Roger J Kerr says a lot of people will be asking whether our 'health first' strategy has delivered the results expected or did we get the balance between health and the economy somewhat skewed?

Summary of key points: -

  • New Zealand’s economic contraction far worse than Australia’s
  • RBNZ continues to toy with the negative interest rate experiment
  • Political and tech stock risk loom for the Kiwi dollar

New Zealand’s economic contraction far worse than Australia’s

How we are performing relative to the Aussies has always been a favourite benchmark for New Zealanders who do not want to see themselves as the poor country cousins to the larger neighbour.

The trans-Tasman rivalries and comparisons are not just confined to the sporting fields, in term of business and economic innovation we always like to get one up on the Ockers as well. The two currency values against the US dollar are also an immediate measure and representation of how the rest of the world see the New Zealand economic performance relative to that of Australia.

The Australian and New Zealand Governments have adopted differing responses to the Covid health emergency and resultant economic shock.

Back in March/April at the height of the economic storm, the Australian Government balanced their advisory body with both health experts and businesspeople to chart a course through the crisis.

Here in New Zealand, Government leaders seemingly shunned the involvement of business folk and relied totally on the health officials for their decisions. The result being that the general public were convinced by the Government that “going early and going hard” with lockdowns to stop the virus would deliver us the best economic result.

The message from Jacinda and Grant was that our economy would recover earlier and stronger than others as the Covid elimination strategy would stand us apart and be to our advantage.

Six months on, the elimination objective has been found to be unrealistic/unworkable and the public mood is shifting because we are not seeing the benefits from the sacrifices the Government asked us to take.

Especially compared to Australia who adopted more targeted lockdowns.

Of course, the NZ Government’s retort to the greater freedoms seen in Australia is that we do not have a Melbourne catastrophe, therefore our response is superior. Slack quarantine control allowing the virus to spread like wildfire in the immigrant communities of Melbourne was unfortunate luck. Perhaps we have had more luck in comparison.

Outside of the Melbourne situation, the Australian economy has benefited from Chinese infrastructure spending, resulting in booming mining prices, cashflows and profits.

The Australian economy contracted by 7% in the June quarter. This Thursday 17th September we get to see how the New Zealand economy compares to that number. It will not be pretty reading with prior GDP forecasts being something of a crapshoot between -10% to -13%.

The more severe lockdowns and foreign tourism being a larger proportion of our economy compared to Australia will explain our inferior result.

Quite rightly, a lot of folk will be asking whether our “health first” strategy has delivered the results expected or did we get the balance between health and the economy somewhat skewed?

Whilst the game of rugby is not everything in life, it does have a disproportionate influence on public attitudes and confidence in New Zealand.

The Aussies stealing away a revenue-generating rugby tournament from us because they are more prepared to accept a balance between risk and reward than the NZ government, will not be going down too well in heartland New Zealand.

Double standards from the bureaucrats around who can come into New Zealand and who cannot, is also adding to the growing disenchantment in business circles in respect to the Government’s handling of the health/economic crisis.

RBNZ continues to toy with the negative interest rate experiment

The contrasts between New Zealand and Australia at this time do not stop at GDP growth and rugby tournaments. The two central banks are at odds with each other in respect to the need for, and likely effectiveness of negative interest rates to stimulate economic recovery.

The RBA has ruled out negative interest rates as ineffective, Adrian Orr at the RBNZ still likes to dangle the carrot to the markets as he sees it as a method to keep the NZ dollar lower than where it would otherwise be.

As Westpac NZ CEO, David McLean adroitly pointed out last week, negative interest rates are likely to cause unintended opposite consequences as deposits are withdrawn from banks (no return) and the banks are unable to lend as much.

In any case, as this column has previously highlighted, corporate New Zealand is not prepared to increase their debt levels no matter what the interest price.

The banks not prepared to lend due to their credit and funding constraints and business borrowers not wanting any further debt until the future is more certain does not add up to negative interest rates achieving the desired stimulation to investment, output expansion and more jobs.

The arguments for the necessity of negative interest rates sometime next year seem to be based on some monetary professors engulfed in a mad experiment or they really believe the NZ economy is headed into a deep dark hole of depression.

My view is that the RBNZ will be forced by the more positive economic evidence to abandon such talk of the need for negative interest rates by December/January and when that happens the Kiwi dollar will receive a boost upwards on its own.

Compared to the AUD, the NZD is currently being artificially and temporarily suppressed by the differing approaches to likely future monetary stimulus tools to be used by the RBA and RBNZ.

The local interest rate markets have started to price-in negative yields in the wholesale forward markets because the banks always believe that the RBNZ’s view on the economic outlook will be accurate. That belief seems misplaced given the RBNZ’s recent poor track-record in forecasting future economic conditions e.g. in August 2019 they sashed the OCR by 0.50% in expectation of a major economic slowdown – they were wrong and by November 2019 and February 2020 they were forced to produce more upbeat assessments of the economy.

Political and tech stock risk loom for the Kiwi dollar

The level of political risk as a negative for the NZ dollar has reduced somewhat with the Green Party shooting themselves in the foot (alongside the National Party with their previous leadership changes) and thus the probability of Labour/Greens coalition government has fallen away.

A clear-cut Labour-only Government after 17 October would be seen by the FX markets as a “status-quo” result and thus neutral for the NZ dollar. Protracted post-election haggling by Labour over policy concessions to form a coalition government with minority parties would be unsettling for the FX markets and likely to send the Kiwi dollar lower.

How the US dollar itself reacts to political outcomes in the US Presidential election will also be fascinating to observe come early November. An unclear result on the night due to vote counting botch-ups between postal and polling booth votes or The Donald refusing to depart the White House would send the US dollar lower. Potential escalating civil unrest in the US would also impact negatively on investment and currency markets.

The short-term prospects for the Kiwi dollar still appear to be on the downside with the GDP contraction hitting the newswire headlines this week and the wild daily volatility up and down in the US technology stocks signalling an end to their bull run. Lower equity markets in the lead up to the US election fit into the view that the NZD/USD rate will move lower over coming week/months before it moves higher on a weaker US dollar in 2021.


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*Roger J Kerr is Executive Chairman of Barrington Treasury Services NZ Limited. He has written commentaries on the NZ dollar since 1981.

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13 Comments

I thought this was a good piece till I got halfway through the discussion on the negative OCR and the author opined that strength in the NZ economy towards the end of this year will counter the need for this...an odd statement given the author's earlier assertion of the great weakness of our economy.
Or does he think it will spring back into strength soon, despite the covid uncertainty, election etc.

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I have yet to read an Article from Roger Kerr that has suggested the NZD is overvalued and needs to fall... his is a perennial NZD bull.

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"Aussies steal the march on us in more ways than one"

We thought NZ was on Top as the only economy in NZ - Housing was booming with Tax free earning so who cares about anything.

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Of course, the NZ Government’s retort to the greater freedoms seen in Australia is that we do not have a Melbourne catastrophe, therefore our response is superior. ....

Yes and the failure in this thinking or the trick being played is that each State operates with a degree of autonomy.
Finer review at NSW, QLD SA & WA level. Show Australian State systems & process in better condition, better administered than we here NZ.

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Agree.. there has been far too much back slapping with 'glad we aint Victoria' whilst never questioning 'could we have done it like NSW'.

NSW kept restaurants, pubs and gyms open with restrictions and managed to contain the Victoria cases that came across the border.

Sadly, its again a case of Labour polticians who have never run a business not understanding the costs of lockdown and are merely content to bask in the glow of 'we aint melbourne'.

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This article misses the mark. NZ locked down harder than Australia in that period so naturally our GDP will have suffered more (Australia kept construction open for example). Since then, Australia has become a basket case. A loose coalition of states and territories with a toothless federal coalition trying to hold them together. All the state borders are closed, Victoria is a police state, Queensland is turning away critically ill patients from border towns yet letting AFL stars and actors fly in at will. The country has completely fractured and digging out sand from the desert and carting it off to China won't fix that. It has inferior public debt dynamics to NZ as well.

As for the negative rates piece, Banks are the big losers so to hear the WBC CEO say that makes it all the more compelling as it means the benefit passes through to borrowers and not the banks shareholders.

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As for the negative rates piece, Banks are the big losers so to hear the WBC CEO say that makes it all the more compelling as it means the benefit passes through to borrowers and not the banks shareholders.

Exactly - retained profits to boost the capital base will fall and lending growth will be stifled unless loan rates rise to compensate for this possible outcome.

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Its only a matter of time before most (if not all) banks are nationalised. The current owners will walk away, and let the state inherit the basket case of mortgages which in time will be greater than the security they hold.

Returns of deposits do not reflect the risk of security, given the banks ponzi scheme is coming to an end.

The younger generation dont know how to save, and cant afford to pay off their student debt let alone a mortgage payment on a house purchase. There's not the security of income how either, as most have a four weeks notice of termination. The cost of insurance is increasing also, which can only mean bad things ahead on loan serviceability.

So who is going to pay for the unsustainable real estate prices. Everyone (through increased taxes); including deposit holders, through the socialisation of bank losses when the current owners walk away and start up another ponzi scheme thats got more life left in it.

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To enable ongoing public support for suppressing Covid there needs to be a prioritised balance of give and take. Earlier this year we had sports played nationally which gave us all the feeling of a just reward from earlier lock down sacrifices. The new reality that we cannot watch sport in a stadium or indeed that the government will not compromise at all to host an international rugby tournament (supportive of the economy and social well-being) shows the labour-led managers have moved closer to becoming an all controlling socialist dictatorship. We seem to be going backwards from an earlier established position of strength.

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Totally agree... its like they are still basking in the international recognition of how well they have played the coronavirus thus far they have decided the only way too move forward is more of the same. The simple fact is others have evolved and the quality of NSW contact tracing has meant they have been able to keep things open and avoid the crushing businesses by taking a lockdown approach.

As businesses close I am not sure the feeling will be 'Gee, didnt Jacinda do well'

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Ahh mineral resources. We're still to find competitive resources in NZ.
Ohh and death rate ..... Yep they sure stole a march on us there

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Another point to ponder. Why were only essential businesses allowed to continue to trade, instead of essential plus unessential safe businesses? Nobody has come up with an honest sensible reason for not doing that. Issues like this are going to be debated more and more over the coming months and years, most to the detriment of our current government.

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"Outside of the Melbourne situation, the Australian economy has benefited from Chinese infrastructure spending, resulting in booming mining prices, cashflows and profits". This is the primary reason why Ozzie economy is outperforming NZ and has jack all to do with the respective covid responses. Tourism and Education 'made' up a higher proportion of our economy than Oz and hence we have taken a bigger hit.

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