A review of things you need to know before you sign off on Wednesday; TD rates trimmed, 'ins' equal 'outs' at the border, SMP price hit, cash still being used widely, FRT on the way, swaps stable, NZD stable, & 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 RATE CHANGES
There are no changes to regular mortgage rates today. But Heartland bank put through its -25 bps OCR cuts to its reverse mortgage and Village Access loans. All rates are here.

BUSINESS BASE RATES DIP
ANZ trimmed its business base rates today by -25 bps, with the Business Bank Indicator Rate to 1.45%, their Agri Current Account to 9.65%, and their Business Overdraft rate to 13.45%. Risk-related margins apply on top of these base rates.

TERM DEPOSIT/SAVINGS RATE CHANGES
BNZ reduced many rates for terms less than 1 year by between -5 bps and -15 bps. Unity Money raised a series of TD rates in what looks like backtracking some it overdid in an earlier cut. Update: Xceda has cut rates too. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.

IN BALANCE
Stats NZ said the number of migrants coming to this country (9329) was almost exactly matched by the number of people departing long term in April (9203). The net gain was just +125 people for the month, the lowest for any month since 2013 (pandemic excepted).

NOT RISING
The overnight dairy Pulse auction brought downbeat results. The key WMP price fell -1.1% in a retreat expected by the derivatives market. But even at this level it remains in the rising trend that started in mid-2024. However, the SMP price fell a hard, down -4.8% and much more than expected. In fact, SMP prices have now broken through their weak rising trend, and look quite vulnerable.

BACK MORE LIKE NORMAL?
There were 267,271 tourism arrivals in April, 280,656 tourist departures. Tourist arrivals from both Australia (132,660) and the US (22,700) have been above pre-pandemic levels over the past few months, as more historic levels return to a broader set of sources.

CASH STILL WIDELY USED
It is only a short series, but the RBNZ H3 quarterly cash use survey which started in 2022 shows that many of us still use cash occasionally for everyday purchases. But predominately we use debit cards/EFTPOS. The use of credit cards for these transactions is declining, and now the 40% of people who say they use credit cards for everyday purchases, that is the lowest level ever.

FRT COMING
Retail NZ has lined up eleven retailing heavy-hitters behind rolling out facial recognition technology (FRT) at the customer-facing parts of their industry as another tool to combat crime and abuse. This builds on the "successful trial" done by Foodstuffs NI.

NZX50 INCHES HIGHER AGAIN
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index is marginally higher so far today. It is up +0.2% from yesterday, and up +0.7% for the past week. But it is down -3.7% since the start of the year although up +6.8% from this time last year. Fletcher, Spark, Ryman, and Gentrack lead the gainers; Heartland, Mercury, Kiwi Property, and Oceania fall. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is down -0.7% so far today.

TRADE TALK FINISHES UP
The China-US trade talks in London seem to have ended, with both parties "agreeing to a framework" on how to resolve their differences. There might be some sort of agreement taking shape over rare earths-for-AI chips, but that still need a signoff from Xi and Trump. It is unlikely much else was agreed. But "the biggest casualty of the trade war has not been lost sales but trust and that China is very cautious, aiming to avoid being drawn into the Trump “circus”, Bloomberg reports one observers saying.

SWAP RATES ON STILL HOLD
Wholesale swap rates are likely little-changed yet again. Keep an eye on our chart below which will record the final positions closer to 5pm. Notice it isn't falling. The 90 day bank bill rate was up +1 bp at 3.32% on Tuesday. The Australian 10 year bond yield is down -4 bps at 4.27%. The China 10 year bond rate is little-changed at 1.69%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is down -4 bps at 4.63% but was down -3 bps to 4.61% in the earlier RBNZ fix today. The UST 10yr yield is now down -3 bps to 4.46%.

EQUITIES DRIFT
The NZX50 is little-changed again, up +0.2% so far today, and the ASX200 is up +0.3% in afternoon trade. Tokyo is up another +0.5% in early Wednesday trade. Hong Kong is up +0.7% at its open while Shanghai is up +0.5%. Singapore has opened down -0.6%. Wall Street ended its Tuesday trade with the S&P500 up +0.5% largely on hopes the London US-China talks would ease some trade tensions.

OIL SLIPS BACK
The oil price is down almost -US$1 at just over US$64.50/bbl in the US, and just over US$66.50/bbl for the international Brent price.

CARBON PRICE HOLDS
The carbon price is holding at NZ$56.50/NZU but very few trades. The next official carbon auction is on Wednesday, June 18, with a $68 floor price. So it will fail. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.

GOLD FIRMER
In early Asian trade, gold is up +US$29/oz from yesterday at US$3337/oz.

NZD MARGINALLY SOFTER
The Kiwi dollar is down -10 bps from yesterday at 60.3 USc. Against the Aussie we are unchanged at 92.7 AUc. Against the euro we are down -20 bps at 52.8 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is now at 68.3 and down -10 bps..

BITCOIN HOLDS
The bitcoin price is now at US$109,757 and up just +0.3% from where we were this time yesterday. Volatility has been low at +/-0.8%.

This soil moisture chart is animated here.

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