Here's our summary of key economic events overnight that affect New Zealand, with news inflation's force is on full display again, and long bond yields are back rising.
But first in the US, consumer inflation was steady at 3.7% in September, the same as August, against market expectations of a slight decrease to 3.6%. A smaller decline in energy prices offset slowing inflationary pressures in other categories. Energy costs fell by -0.5%, following a -3.6% decrease in August, primarily because petrol prices rose offsetting other energy like natural gas and electricity price retreats.
Core inflation, that is without food or energy, fell to a still-high 4.1%, but that is its lowest in two years.
Meanwhile, the actual number of Americans filing for jobless benefits last week was unchanged from the prior week at 197,000 which was below estimates of 210,000 and remaining close to the seven-month low. There are now 1.55 mln people on these benefits, also lower. No labour market stress signs here.
Between the two metrics - brisk inflation holding and extending labour market strength - the Fed seems still a long way off being able to declare victory. The higher for longer theme we saw in yesterday's Fed minutes for its September meeting is justified by this latest data.
In the background, US Social Security payments will rise by +3.2% from January 1, 2024, it was announced overnight. That will affect more than 70 mln recipients. But that is a lot less than the +8.7% rise for 2023. The 2024 increase will amount to about +US$59/month per person taking it to US$1907/month (NZ$3210/month or NZ$740/week.)
In India, retail price inflation dropped to 5.0% in September 2023, down from 6.8% in August and well below the expected 5.5%. A year ago it was running at 7.4%. This new level fell within their central bank's 2-6% target range for the first time in three months, primarily due to a significant slowdown in food inflation.
India also released August industrial production data and it was unusually strong. It climbed +10.3% from a year ago, the highest since June last year. That is up from a +5.7% rise in the previous month and above market expectations of a 9% gain.
In China, banks are pushing out more debt. They extended +¥1.36 tln in new yuan loans in August (+NZ$315 bln), marking a sharp increase from July's +¥0.35 tln (+NZ$80 bln) and even above the market bounceback expectations of +¥1.20 tln (+NZ$275 bln). This expansion fits their central bank goal of bolstering economic growth in the face of subdued demand both domestically and internationally.
In Australia, prudential regulator APRA said no bank breached capital and liquidity buffers in stress tests that assumed house prices fell by a third and unemployment spiked to 10%.
The global container freight rates fell yet again last week, to be -60% lower than a year ago and -4% lower than the ten year average, one that includes the huge pandemic surge. In contrast, freight rates for bulk cargoes are still rising, and rising fast. They are now back to year-ago levels which is 3.5 times higher than they were when they bottomed out in February.
The UST 10yr yield starts today up +10bps from yesterday at 4.71%. Their key 2-10 yield curve is less inverted, now by -39 bps. Their 1-5 curve is now at -75 bps and fractionally less inverted. Their 3 mth-10yr curve inversion is much less today at -72 bps. The Australian 10 year bond yield is now at 4.44% and back up +8 bps from yesterday. But the China 10 year bond rate is unchanged at 2.74%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is down -5 bps at 5.43%.
There was a UST 30yr bond tender overnight for US$20 bln, and it only drew US$47 bln in bids which was considered low. The median yield rose to 4.74%, which was more than expected.
The S&P500 is down -0.8% in its Thursday trade. Overnight, European markets mixed, bookended by London up +0.3% and Paris down -0.4%. Yesterday, Tokyo ended its Thursday session up +1.8%. Hong Kong ended up +1.9%. And Shanghai closed up +0.9%. The ASX200 was little-changed. The NZX50 ended its Thursday session down a mere -0.1%.
The price of gold will start today at just on US$1869/oz and down -US$4 from this time yesterday.
Oil prices have slipped another -US$1.50 to just over US$81.50/bbl in the US. The international Brent price is now just on US$85/bbl.
The Kiwi dollar starts today at 59.4 USc and down -¾c from yesterday as commodity currencies fall out of favour. Against the Aussie we are slightly softer at 93.8 AUc. Against the euro we are down -½c to 56.3 euro cents. That all means our TWI-5 starts today at under 69.7 which is down -50 bps from yesterday.
The bitcoin price starts today at US$26,676 which is virtually unchanged (-US$3) from this time yesterday. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been low at +/-0.7%.
The easiest place to stay up with event risk is by following our Economic Calendar here ».
120 Comments
I'm in Spain and I see very few homeless. Yet unemployed is much higher than in NZ and the climate is certainly much better for rough sleeping.
There is support for people who struggle in NZ, so why are there so many homeless here?
Is it an acceptance that is OK to sleep on the streets? Is it just giving up on life and stop trying? What is it?
Ask them?
Mental health. It's a complex issue.
No it not mental health. I work in the sector.
So you are saying it's not part of the problem?
Homelessness is associated with mental health problems (cause or effect).
But it does not imply that people with mental health issues choose to remain homeless if they are given appropriate accommodation options.
So what is it then? You must have insight, since you work in the sector.
See above. GTG to work now
My friends working in the sector say its mostly housing issues, which haven't been addressed for 20 years, so now you get the next generation growing up in unstable housing with severe social issues. Add to that how expensive day-to-day living has become through a combination of monopoly/cartel behaviour in required industries and poor response from consecutive caretaker governments exacerbating the issues, you start to see why its hard for people and homelessness becomes a thing. Only people who have won in the last 20 years are property owners that got in early or were able to leverage their capital gains into locking up more of the market. This has created losers as well, those on the street are the consequence.
I'm also curious OR. Please give us your insight. Don't leave us hanging?
See above
I accept that for some but not all.
if you are homeless in NZ you get very little support, you cannot claim a benefit without an address, also many have mental or drug issues and we don't have a lot of places in those spaces to place people. the proportion of people living homeless by choice with no outlier issues is a lot smaller than you would think.
also don't get confused by those begging in NZ and homeless, check the shoes if they have on new trainers and are young they are just lazy and don't want to work and are most likely on a benefit
Agree with Yvil. I was in Portugal and Spain for work and although they have their own economic struggles I did not see people casually ram raiding.
I suspect there is growing hostility and resentment here, being directed at people who work hard to achieve success and earn a living; and it is being encouraged by some others for their own agenda......
The report shows that while the richest 1 percent captured 54 percent of new global wealth over the past decade, this has accelerated to 63 percent in the past two years. $42 trillion of new wealth was created between December 2019 and December 2021. ...sounds fair?
Not fair. But letting your animal spirits go on a rampage to counter that (aka random violence) is irrational
People are irrational..are you sure you are qualified?
As qualified as you feel justified.... (baiting me)
Could you list them?
I am sorry Baywatch but No. You are crossing a boundary there and since I am not employed by you nor require licensing from your authority - I will not list my credentials.
Also I need to stop this conversation. Many thanks
Noted thank you for starting the discussion and crossing your imaginary line.
Quite right. Perhaps Baywatch could just go back to his Pamela Anderson fantasies and leave the comments to people who want to discuss the contents of the above article.
Strawman X2
I think it’s more because people that work hard aren’t getting rewarded, hard work is becoming increasingly disassociated from higher incomes. It isn’t the hard workers who have benefitted the most over the last few years it’s been asset holders, which whilst they worked hard to get where they are, the level of financial gains they’ve had when compared to incomes has little to do with how hard they worked.
...& lack of consequences.
To a degree. But we are seeing the same issues pop up in the US, UK, Canada and Australia. Some of them have quite harsh punishments and consequences yet they’re still having the same issues as us.
I was listening to a good analysis the other day, of U.S. cities. Basically, rinsing and repeating:
- Policy drives a housing crisis and enriches those born earlier.
- Homeless numbers rise hugely. Social problems too.
- Tough on crime rhetoric follows.
A lack of willingness to deal with causes because it might mean accepting slightly smaller personal enrichment from property means things don't improve. Trying to simply "tough on crime" a way out only results in looking more like a developing country: hiding in gated subdivisions, harsh punishment, but no drop in crime.
Our older generations were given more of a stake in capitalism through policy that deliberately aimed to make home ownership (thus capital accumulation) more accessible to average working Kiwis. It worked. They still believe in that sort of provision, at least for themselves: universal old age benefit, Goldcard subsidies, bailouts when property is affected by weather etc.
I think most review of street people emergence in the past 15 years since the GFC misses the fundamental census who makes up the cohort In the main its not what people think. "Poor Farms" were around for over 100 years in each major country. Purpose was to shelter and house those down on their luck mainly due to events outside their control. Loss of job and inability to find replacement. In return those families taken in so that they were not destitute and begging on the streets gave back and contributed to the operation of the public facility--known as Poor Farms because beneficiaries toiled in the fields and were generally self sufficient in food production as many Southern US prison still are today.. They may have been wards of the state but they were not bludgers. Most moved out when sustainable jobs opened up after period of financial crisis.
Contrast that today with the census of Street People and few fit the description of people who had ordered lives but lost it through no cause of their own. Most today are leading undisciplined- unordered lives (addicts)--and reject an imposition of order on their lives and have in this era through Government Policy have been enabled to get deeper into their "pit' that they might otherwise have been drawn out of-but only if there were real consequences.
Fox example my son manages a large Commercial Building that for 10 years was operating at 95% occupancy. Covid changed that to 70% and falling. ( no a business failure and the owners have lost millions of their capital) This major no 13 Metropolitan area in American now has has thousands sleeping on the streets and thwarted efforts for employers to draw their workers back to the CBD due to chaos in the streets,which furthers hampers evening entertainment in areas the formerly enjoyed. Home to the George Floyd incident the councils response was to thrown bottomless pit money at the problem of street people. Policing as changed and thus a new hands off by police policy is replaced by squads of social workers who are out on the street everyday directly interceding with countless offers by Non Profit Social Agencies providing home and shelter till they get back on their feet.--But monthly meetings from the 1st Precinct Police Commander to the effected Building owners points a grim pictures. only 1 in 100 street people wants to take up the assistance--why ? simply because they have to live with rules.
Until society said you have had your chance at doing it on you own with no rules and stops enabling and says "that's 'strike 3" , which means they are now forcibly institutionalized in special build compounds, (surrounded by medical, mental, and educational support) and then and only then after they start living within social rules do they get to graduate out. There is absolutely no way to clean this mess up without going back in time when people had to conduct themselves within society rules, rather than allow the people who fell into harms way to take control of cities and ruin the neighbourhoods.
Its not hard to do --Just takes a set of rate payers who hear from change agent political leaders that business as usual has to stop and things return to as things were --and still are in places like Spain & Portugal. Bleeding heart response is killing any hopes for many of these people by allowing to personal responsibility combined with no enforcement. Tough Love is only credible know way to handle this crisis successfully. San Francisco Mayor just announced allow those laying about on the street receiving welfare stipends to buy their drugs with will miss out if the do not comport to monthly drug testing. Why did we ever get to a place when they was not a requirement? And the next shoe that is about to drop in all these major cities is Council Valuations on buildings in the CBD's dropping by the millions with corresponding drops in property rates--placing only more upwards pressure on home owners to replace the lost Rates payments from CBD buildings that are falling in value.
Bleeding heart welfarism for our older generations. Own two feet for the young.
Also poor morality being exhibited in policy. Our policy approach in recent years (and decades) has been one of transferring wealth away from wages and savings to property, and it's pushed people out the bottom. Particularly egregious was the huge wealth transfer to property that the Reserve Bank and govt perpetuated over COVID years via monetary policy.
It's all very well to say, "but you see, our transferring wealth from the poor to the rich via policy is legal!" To expect no social consequences? To expect the poor to accept those morals and not react? That might be asking too much.
Pretty normal human behaviour considering the ever growing inequities of nz society. Your comment re working hard is bolllocks, owning assets is the road to wealth these days, actually doing anything usefull is optional.
Personal prioritisation? Are landlords pumping rents because they know accommodation supplements will fund them? I believe this to be so, as they claim it is the market but they clearly expect to make a profit while being subsidised by the taxpayer. Without those subsidies most landlords would collapse, even the many mom & pop one or two house ones.
I've said it before but I believe rents should be restricted to 25 - 30% of the median take home pay.
Murray, the thread is about homelessness and rough sleepers. Could we not for once leave the housing issue out of it. BTW, homeless people can have a roof over their head if they choose to, that's why i'm asking the question.
As you are a emergency homeless provider Yvil you could provide us with some insight as to the reasons ...and how can housing issues not be part of the problem?
Certainly Baywatch, and that's precisely why I said that anyone can get a roof over their head. But it does mean one has to bother with going to WINZ to apply for emergency accommodation. This accommodation will then be granted but often, the problem is that the "homeless" who get "re-housed" behave so anti-socially or are dirty or doing drugs or get into fights, that they et kicked out and then they can't get other emergency accommodation. This is IMO, their own fault.
And after they get kicked out because of the unstable social housing issues, do they magically disappear? Or do they... become homeless?
(trying to lead a horse to water...)
In the olden days, people who could not behave in a manner that pleased any landlord in the country, would probably have been correctly classified as not being able to function in society, and would have been removed and treated in a manner that would hopefully change them into people who could cope in some manner with society. Not any more. Our streets are littered with them. Wokeness springs to mind. Endless executive meetings and hand wringing articles in the news don't seem to provide the desired result. Blaming everybody in our country's history except the people we are talking about doesn't seem to work either. What is the solution? Instead of sealioning, ( I love that new meaning for the word) we could comment constructively on the matter. It won't do any good, but it will make us feel better.
It wasn't wokeness that closed / reduced mental health and other services and pushed people out on their own ("in the community"). I remember the 1980s.
In the olden days, we didn't have a massive cohort of rentier specuvestors pumping up house prices to an enormous degree aided by compliant central banks. In the old days we had governments that had enough balls to tackle the heart of social problems, not participate in their harm by owning multiple rental properties themselves.
It's nice to reminisce about the past, but it doesn't apply to the current situation which is about to get a whole lot worse thanks to us voting in a declared property investor who has already stated he will change all the rules to suit himself and a finance minister who has a degree in English Literature.
The English Lit degree is not the bad part either, it's the Journalism post-grad qualification that will put the "spin" on the numbers.
Blobbles--Answer is see my post above for an answer to your question.
Thats not an answer that addresses the problem, that's an anecdote that ignores the root of the problem and asks that we revert to a system of rugged individualism for the individual and corporate/monetarist bailout for the rich.
No, the root of the problem is Governments today are far more tolerant with anti-social behavior, and too many more people are lost to Drugs.
No, the root of the problem is almost exclusively linked to housing issues, which you conveniently ignore, as does Yvil, who believes homelessness has nothing to do with housing (an absolutely idiotic remark if ever I have heard it). The CONSEQUENCES are antisocial behaviour on a mass scale. People aren't committing crimes for no reason, the root cause is almost always tracked back to their upbringing, lack of access to services which most of us take for granted. In this country, its more often than not linked to insecure housing, family groups being constantly shifted around or living in motels, unable to have stable relationships, unable to have a stable education, broken families etc.
Dude…
Leave housing out of a conversation about homelessness???
His income is derived from people being homeless.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.
― Upton Sinclair
Isn't it infuriating when you continue to try to raise the level of conversation by pointing out people's unconscious biases and heuristics to themselves, and yet they hate you for it.
Suggestion: "Let us view the world and make financial decisions from a place beyond our own blind spots shall we?"
Response: "How dare you point out my blind spots that prevent me from seeing what is really happening here!"
Not just true for this thread, but common in most of the arguments/disagreements that occur on this website.
I had hoped we could comment on the stuff in the article, and economic bits related to it. I, for one do not want to hear your opinions on the character defects of people you have never met, who make comments on this site. Next you will be talking about Critical Race Theory, and other rubbish.
I have no interest in the colour of peoples skin or their race. Only their character and desire to do well by one another. Critical Race Theory is a blind spot for me so thank you for bringing it up - I actually had to Google it to understand what it was!
I agree with you - it looks like a pretty crazy concept.
See - I can agree with you after you have identified a blind spot (my lack of understanding of critical race theory). Will others be willing to do the same?
Any other defects that you would like to point out regarding my own character - or would that make you a hypocrite for doing the same thing that you are judging me of?
Bruh…
There it is.. the worst take I have seen all week.
"the thread is about homelessness and rough sleepers. Could we not for once leave the housing issue"
"homeless people can have a roof over their head if they choose to"
Oh, sweet summer child.
Up there with “what storm?”
How could I forget! That is a hall of fame comment
He surely has cemented his place ..cant touch this!
....its elitism in its purity - totally gross.
Interesting response Yvil. I'm fascinated now. To what degree do you believe rough sleeping and homelessness is not connected to housing, especially the cost of it? And how?
.......crickets 🦗
See my reply to Baywatch above.
"Murray, the thread is about homelessness and rough sleepers. Could we not for once leave the housing issue out of it."
No Yvil, we cannot because the housing crisis in New Zealand is intricately related to homelessness. Maybe it's because your livelihood depends on not making this connection is the reason you struggle to understand it.
I put it to you all that if house prices and rents halved tomorrow, homelessness would not be eliminated, and you all know deep down, that this is true!
Do you think it would help? I'd be surprised if anyone is claiming high house prices are the sole contributor to homelessness, but I'm equally surprised that anyone would deny it's part of the problem.
If I had to halve my rents, and my profit margins plummetted as a result, I would be taking even more precautions to ensure the suitability of my tenants, as, obviously, I would have very little fat in my system to repair smashed properties. So the bottom feeder tenants would be no better off.
Shouldn't you be taking as many precautions as you can anyway, within what the law will allow you to do? What more will you do to ensure suitability of your tenants?
The only thing preventing us from dialing back rents (and house prices) to a much more reasonable ratio to a renter's income is landlord's debt loading. Nobody asked landlords to soak themselves in debt, but they did and the market rose as a result of this added (but not needed) demand.
"So the bottom feeder tenants would be no better off"
The only bottom feeders in our society sit23 are those who are looking to get rich at the expense of these people living near the poverty line.
It would actually help one hell of a lot. Working people aren't living in cars because they choose to, its because they have been priced out of the rental market. If rent prices halved tomorrow, many more would be able to seek housing at a price point they can afford. Consequently to your fantastical situation, many landlords would be forced to sell their property as their LVR would be negative, bringing on a lot of housing into the market, including a lot of houses currently used for AirBnB.
An absolute heap of people have moderate savings for a house, but cannot afford to enter the market. FHB numbers would be huge. They could then raise their children in secure housing, lowering future social issues.
Best would be if this happened at the same time we dealt to the cost of building new housing, which is linked to monopoly behaviour, huge middle men profiteers, huge productivity issues, inability to fund infrastructure etc. Its only if all 3 of these things happen in our fantastic scenario that we might get back to some semblance of normality and deal with the social issues that stem from it.
Some light reading -
What Drives Rents in New Zealand? National and Regional Analysis | The Treasury New Zealand
Unfortunately it only focuses on wages and not the accommodation supplement (which one would think would be more useful).
Spanish authorities can be pretty harsh. Maybe they drag them off the streets and lock them away.
You don’t mess with the Guardia Civil. Just ask any Brits who were at the 1982 World Cup.
Strangely, I saw some no alcohol behaviour in Rome as well, the student quarter after midnight, orderly queues waiting to get into cafes or eating icecreams.
Where did we go wrong?
In Spain I saw a paddy wagon arrest some young people who appeared to be trying a picnic in a garden square in Granada, presume they broke a by law...
hmmmm
They were probably on the grass, which seems to be a crime punishable by death in half of Europe!
CGT
You would need a long drag of hopium to think a cgt would increase rental availability and lower rents.
There are quite a few of us sucking on that at the moment.
Reducing the cost of housing by 50% would do the job. Question is would CGT help or make things worse.
True, but LVT on unimproved value of land coupled with liberalising zoning and winding down landlords' rental yield welfare subsidies would.
The cost of rent is a big reason for homelessness in the US, which I’m sure is a factor here. Rents in Welly are getting prohibitively higher (I’m currently looking), and competition seems to have increased with record immigration.
https://www.npr.org/2023/07/12/1186856463/homelessness-rent-affordable-…
There’s no one reason, and it wouldn’t be fair to blame the houseless (ie implying they’ve all given up on life), as there are different circumstances to each individual…but the cost of living is high. And just look how hard it is to rent in Australia right now, and it’s easy to see how one might find themselves in a desperate situation.
There is an element of precariarity to consider too. Personally I have known a few people who were tipped into homelessness when they kicked out a place and couldn't afford another one in their budget. Sometimes it might be a nice old landlord who has kept the rent low who then passes away and the kids sell the house, or they get evicted for helping out friends who then cause all kinds of trouble.
This happens a lot in a shortage because people get pushed down the affordability chain and you end up with lots of families competing for the cheapest places. Boarding houses are the last resort before you hit the street but they aren't for everyone, some guys would rather live a bit more independently.
I've been in Fiji for the past three months. There are no homeless where I am in Savusavu. Reason being the family unit/village is still very much alive. They don't have much by western standards, but they are happy, fed and are housed.
It's the break down in the family network and general me me me behaviour that creates the issues we have. Western society has got it wrong.
I would say the same is true in Spain, much stronger family units and a more collectivist approach versus our more individualism based culture. Both have their strengths and weaknesses but homelessness would be one where the individual approach is firmly beaten.
Same throughout the Pacific. But many still want to come and live in a leaky garage in Auckland.
Wages here are as low as 2.50 fjd an hour, 5 an hour is about average.
(Regarding Sluggy's 8:38am comment) This is so true. Similar in Spain where, despite economic struggles and high unemployment, people get by because of a strong family unit. Many "kids" in Spain stay at home till they are 30, even if they are married
If the rest of the extended family are renting then taking in other family will more often than not not be an option with limits to the numbers in a rental. And as the ownership rates drop the more of a problem that will be.
The house price explosion has lots to do with. Insane negligence by government allowing (causing) that to happen.
When we had adequate house price and availability they could find somewhere. But the current situation means they get pushed of the bottom off the bottom.
Of course there are homeless, but be careful interpreting what you see. I worked in serious community mental health. There were highly visible individuals assumed to be homeless but they were not. Just visible.
Often with serious spending keeping them fed, clean and housed.
Probably depends on what city you are in. Maybe the Spaniards have special camps for the homeless, hidden away from the tourists.
Don' t recall Spain having many motels so can't be housed there.
Spain takes housing affordability and homelessness seriously. The state actively recognises systemic issues and tries to address them. In NZ people like Yvil try to blame the homeless.
https://dobetter.esade.edu/en/spain-law-housing-homeless#:~:text=Nearly….
I voted at the start of the week and happily turned off the telly when the debate was on.
I see on the Herald a young mother shot at police to help her teenagers escape after a ram raid. I'm so sick of this. One more sleep.
You think ram raids will magically stop next week?! (Or even during the next govt's term?)
Would you like to buy a bridge?
Sadly he does think they will stop..
UK has had a right-wing government for over a decade and ramraiding is still happening. You will notice that the South England gang are white men. Crime is due to drugs and poverty, not race.
They were jailed for 5 years plus though. So no more ramraiding for a little while.
Two stores targeted in attempted ram-raids as police hunt 'young male' suspects (msn.com)
Ram raid at BP petrol station and Spar shop off A1 in Tickencote, Rutland (msn.com)
'Ruthless' gang jailed for south England ram-raid spree - BBC News
Bollards in the shape of Chris Luxon are going to be installed in front of all target shops as a physical and mental deterrent that will stop ram raiding once and for all.
The real bonus is we will not need to do much redesigning of the existing bollard shape to achieve this.
Comment of the day haha
I think we will be told less that we need to empathize with the victims, that the only thing the police can do is to let them go and maybe give the owner a fog cannon.
Right, so no change then.
I truely expect crime to get worse under National. It's all election BS talk and people are buying into it. Even more in our society will feel disenfranchised and we'll see the consequences.
What they will do is change the metric which records crime. Ram raids will be redesignated as "vehicular accidents involving shops". Voilá! Ram raids reduced.
Will be able to collate the data into one nice graph, showing a huge spike for ages under 18 and over 65's.
Meanwhile, they plan to ramraid the younger generations for their wealth via housing and tax policy, and the poor and sick via reducing their benefits over time - all while giving property speculators a ride off productive Kiwis' backs.
Wealth appreciation from property speculation appears to be a poisoned chalice. As Jesus put it; what is it to gain the world if you lose your own soul. What does it benefit you to become rich if the society within which you live gets worse? (Ie worse wealth inequality, people living in poverty and higher crime, less social cohesion?)
It feels good to the ego, but does nothing to improve the quality of being of the human species as a whole.
Not much feedback on the debate last night which is strange.
An Oz perspective on Fletchers Iplex strife, makes grim reading.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-10-12/bgc-fletchers-war-of-words-over-…
We sold our Fletchers shares around a decade ago after another of their major balls up. An arrogant company that can only survive & thrive if regulator protected (Council Gib spec) &/or captive market (Covid).
What a mess for Fletchers. That photo of the split in the pipe certainly points to a product issue. Though would love to see a data recorder of pressure spikes in the new homes.
Anyone know if this product is being used in nz?
Polybutylene pipe most certainly is used in NZ. Buteline and Dux Secura are 2 brands that come to mind.
The old Dux Quest pipe that was the cause of massive amount of leaks in the 70's was also Polybutylene.
It's still an issue. Every house insurer in NZ has a Dux Quest clause in their policies.
Was talking to my colleague today about this, turns out his rental property has sprung a leak. Dux Quest.
It's shocking that our media haven't run with this issue. The trouble is that NZ journalists can't investigate any issue that contains even the smell of something technical, apart from IT. I would say that 99.9% of our journalists didn't take the 'hard' science subjects at school so can't understand anything to do with science let alone engineering.
What is Fletcher's response? Surely they have been researching this problem since it first appeared month's ago. Have they just been kicking the can down the road hoping it wil go away?
If we are using the same pipe here, where are all the homes with burst piping?
With a day left to run on the election campaign, the only thing I can say for certain is that whatever you think of Luxon, Chippy, Seymour, Peters and all the other party leaders, I prefer all of them to the current crop of self-aggrandizing, egotistical, loving-the-sound-of-their-own-voices, so-called "journalists" like the one who hosted last night's debate ... they are a pox on the discourse of the nation.
One suspects that Reserve Banks across OECD countries will soon realise no amount of wishful thinking will return inflation to their targets.
The prospect of our next government being unable to stabilise and function is obviously an underlying threat to NZ’s ability to combat inflation vis a vis the NZ$ in that a significant devaluing, as a result of international perception of a questionable government, will fuel inflation by the rising costs of imports. And let’s not forget that this Labour government has told us over and over again that NZ’s inflation has been mostly imported.
The major problem for Reserve Banks is that the old tools no longer work like they used too (whether they actually worked the way they were touted to is another story). People have got wise.
And static wealth has become centralized while dynamic wealth is spent the week it is earned.
Globally, the RBs need to find better tools ... or just give up.
Paul Krugman is the enemy of 90% of America. No joke. The policies of people like him have caused immense, irreparable harm, yet they all continue to somehow be promoted in the media. Paul is spitting in our faces. Link
By removing used cars, food, energy and housing you are stripping off over 60% of CPI components. It's like saying Italy sucks if you don't account for weather, cuisine, art and nice people. Link
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment.
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.