A review of things you need to know before you sign off on Monday; retail trade stops falling but not good, service sector weak, FMA finds K/S fund manager risks in commercial property tolerable, swaps soft, NZD holds, & more

Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today (or if you work from home, before you shutdown your laptop).

MORTGAGE/LOAN RATE CHANGES
Heartland reduced its reverse equity mortgage rate by -36 bps to 9.89%. The Police Credit Union reduced two key fixed rates. Kāinga Ora has cut all its rates, fixed and floating. They cut their floating rate by -52 bps. All rates are here. Update: BNZ has cut most fixed rates, especially their short 6 mos and 1 yr rates. More here.

TERM DEPOSIT/SAVINGS RATE CHANGES
Xceda Finance cut rates on all its TD offers, as they continue to realign rates in anticipation of being in the Deposit Compensation Scheme. All updated rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.

NO SEPTEMBER EXPANSION
Cardholders spent $8.6 bln and made 157 mln transactions in September, but electronic card spending still ends the month flat, and the downturn in retail spending looks like it's been arrested. But September 2024 is still down -5.6% from a year ago.

SERVICE SECTOR STILL DRAGGING
BNZ says "The Performance of Services Index (PSI) was unchanged at 45.7 in September. The PSI has improved since June’s awful result of 41.0 but service sector conditions are still extremely challenging. The PSI remains in contraction and well below its long-run average of 53.1. Movements in the PSI sub-indices were mixed in September, but all of them have been below 50 for seven consecutive months. While falling interest rates will be supportive in time, the sector continues to face significant headwinds at present."

GOVT TO REFORM AML/CFT ACT
The Government will reform anti-money laundering and countering financing of terrorism laws to "provide significant regulatory relief to businesses," Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee says. The reforms will come in three parts, she says, with the first step to "deliver immediate relief" via two bills including the Statutes Amendment Bill, which has already been introduced to Parliament. The second part will focus on structural changes and a sustainable funding model, to create a more effective and efficient system, McKee says. The third part "will make additional regulatory changes to implement international standards and deliver a more risk-based system."

NZX EQUITY MARKET UPDATE
Check out our quick update of how the NZX is faring today, as at 3pm. NZX, and Stride Property gain and The Warehouse recovers some. Gentrack and Scales slip back

CAPITAL RAISING, BUT NO PUBLIC POOL
Kiwibank has announced an offer of up to $100 mln for perpetual preference shares (with the ability to accept oversubscriptions at Kiwibank’s discretion). They will constitute Additional Tier 1 Capital for Kiwibank’s regulatory capital requirements. They will may a premium of about 3.9% above the five year swap rate to encourage sales of these share that rank behind everything else (including customer deposits), but ahead of the State's shareholding equity in the bank.

SANGUINE EXCEPT FOR LIQUIDITY RISK
FMA research released today has found that most KiwiSaver fund managers are not excessively exposed to the risks of commercial real estate. “What we found in this research was largely reassuring – most New Zealand fund managers have been taking a pretty conservative approach to this sector – in many cases they’re underweight against their own targets." But they did find that they need to scale back their liquidity risks from the sector. More here.

STAYING 'DOWN'
Bank settlement accounts at the RBNZ have remained in the lower zone in September after dropping in August. They are now back to levels first ascended to in July 2021. They are now -$23.5 bln below their pear 22 months ago.

REINZ DUE
We expect the REINZ will release its September results at about 9am tomorrow morning. We will have a full review.

EXPANDING FAST
Singapore said it's economy grew +4.1% in Q3-2024 from a year earlier. That is its fastest pace in two years and accelerated from +2.9% growth in the Q2-2024 quarter.

SWAP RATES LOWER
Wholesale swap rates are probably a little lower today. Our chart below will record the final positions. The 90 day bank bill rate is up +1 bp to 4.65%. The Australian 10 year bond yield is up +5 bps at 4.31%. The China 10 year bond rate is unchanged at 2.15%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is up +9 bps from this time Saturday at 4.53%. And the earlier RBNZ fix was at 4.44% and up +5 bps from FRiday. The UST 10yr yield is now at 4.10% and up +3 bps from Saturday. Their 2yr is now at 3.95%, so that curve is now positive by +15 bps in a recovery from Saturday.

EQUITIES MIXED
The NZX50 is now down almost -0.6% in late Monday trade. But the ASX200 is up +0.5% in afternoon trade. Tokyo is closed for a public holiday (Sports Day). Hong Kong is down a sharp and growing -2.1% at its open. Shanghai started +0.4% higher at its open but that is vanishing in a falling mood. Singapore is trading up +0.3% at its open. The S&P500 futures indicate that Wall Street will open up +0.6%. This week, earnings reports will help set the tone and direction.

OIL DOWN
The oil price is down -US$1 from this morning at just under US$74.50/bbl in the US, and under US$78/bbl for the international Brent price.

CARBON PRICE FIRM
The carbon price rose marginally today to $62.75/NZU. See our new daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.

GOLD FALLS
In early Asian trade, gold is down -US$10 from this time yesterday, now at US$2646/oz.

NZD HOLDS
The Kiwi dollar is down -20 bps from this morning, back to 60.9 USc. Against the Aussie we are still at 90.5 AUc. And against the euro we are down -10 bps and back at 55.8 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is little-changed at 69.2 from this morning.

BITCOIN HOLDS
The bitcoin price is down a minor -0.7% from this time yesterday, now at US$62,535. Volatility of the past 24 hours has been low at just on +/- 0.9%.

This soil moisture chart is animated here.

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