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
No changes to report today. All rates are here. And note, you can compare mortgage offers with our new calculator that takes into account other costs and cashback incentives, here.
TERM DEPOSIT/SAVINGS RATE CHANGES
Westpac has trimmed its term deposit rates further. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.
COMATOSED NOW BUT LIFE IN 2026
Housing market to remain subdued this year before house price rises next year, Westpac economist Kelly Eckhold says.
DEMOGRAPHICS IS DESTINY
Cotality says supply of housing has overtaken population growth in some parts of NZ, contributing to downward pressure on property values.
ONE IN EIGHT TO HAVE INDIAN ETHNICITY
In just over 20 years, about a third of our population are likely to identify with Asian ethnicities, up from 19% in 2023, according to projections released by Stats NZ today. Within the broad Asian grouping, those identifying with Indian ethnicities are projected to increase from 7% in 2023 to around 12% in 2048. Over the same period, those identifying with Chinese ethnicities are projected to increase from 6% to around 8%. All ethnicities are aging, but recent migrants will have the fastest expansion of our under 15 age groups.
BROAD RISE OF RENEWABLES SAVES THE DAY
MBIE's Q2-2025 energy review shows that hydro generation was down -6.8% from the June 2024 quarter, with lower hydro storage in April contributing to this. But that vulnerability was covered by strong rises in other renewable sources. Geothermal production was up +12.6% on the same basis, wind generation was up +17.6%, there was a 48.7% increase in generation from solar. Gas and coal generation down -0.9% and -38% respectively. So the share of electricity generation from renewable sources increased 2.7 percentage points to 84.1%. However that is lower than the 88% in 2023 when hydro was not under stress.
NZX50 WEAKER
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index was down -0.6% in a weakish Thursday session. But it is up +0.5% over the past five working days. It is up +1.0% year-to-date. And it is now up +4.5% from a year ago. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is down a full -1.0% today so far. Ryman, Summerset, SkyCity casino, and Serko fall while the NZX, Mainfreight, Turners, and Freightways all rise
BASICALLY STABLE
As expected, Japan’s producer prices rose +2.7% in the year to August, up from a marginally revised +2.5% increase in the previous month. This data doesn't really add stress or new factors for Japan. A year earlier their PPI rose at a 2.6% rate.
AUSSIES EXPECT SWELLING INFLATION
Consumer inflation expectations in Australia rose to 4.7% in the September survey by the Melbourne Institute, from August’s five-month low of 3.9%. The increase came as stronger domestic demand raised concerns about renewed inflationary pressures, with household consumption proving resilient in Q2-2025. This is the sort of news the RBA will not welcome. No rate cut is priced in for September 30 but one is for November 4, although that might get reassessed now.
SHARP TURN DOWN
New independent analysis shows that the long-held view that American demographics would remain very positive to the end of the century have suddenly turned. Now US deaths will exceed births by 2031, far faster than expected. And the deaths will rise quicker until 2055 when they will match immigration. And these estimates are before the Kennedy/Trump health mistakes which will undoubtedly speed up deaths. And the Trump heavy-handed immigration crackdowns that will likely mean the immigration assumptions are far too optimistic. If demographics are destiny, the destiny of the US looks grim and we can no longer hold the assumption that it will be a major power by 2100. That is a sharp change from the demographic outlook just a few years ago.
SWAP RATES STILL ON HOLD AT SHORT END
Wholesale swap rates are will probably be little-changed today at the one year term but lower and flatter for longer durations. Keep an eye on our chart below which will record the final positions closer to 5pm. The 90 day bank bill rate was unchanged at 2.99% on Wednesday. Today, the Australian 10 year bond yield is down -4 bps from yesterday at 4.24%. The China 10 year bond rate is also up +3 bps at 1.82%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is down -7 bps from yesterday at 4.32%. The RBNZ data is now all delayed by one business day now, and was up +2 bps at 4.33% at the end of Wednesday trade. The UST 10yr yield is down -3 bps from yesterday, now at 4.05%.
EQUITIES MIXED, LOCALLY LOWER
The local equity market is down -0.6% in Thursday trade. The ASX200 is down -0.4% in afternoon trade. Tokyo has opened up +1.0%. Hong Kong down -0.7% with Shanghai up +0.8% in an unusual divergence. Singapore has opened unchanged. Wall Street ended its Wednesday session with the S&P500 up +0.3%.
OIL FIRMISH AGAIN
The oil price in the US is up +50 USc at just over US$63.50/bbl with the international Brent price just on US$67.50/bbl.
CARBON PRICE FIRMISH
There are few trades today but the price has ticked up to $58. The next official carbon auction is on December 3, 2025 and likely heading for another failure. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.
GOLD JUST OFF ITS HIGH
In early Asian trade, gold is down -US$3 from this time yesterday at US$3634/oz and off its record high.
NZD ON HOLD
The Kiwi dollar is unchanged from this time yesterday, still at 59.4 USc. Against the Aussie we are down -10 at 89.8 AUc. Against the euro we are unchanged at 50.7 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is now at just over 66.7 and little-changed from this time yesterday.
BITCOIN RISES
The bitcoin price is now at US$113,855 and up +2.2% from this time yesterday. Volatility has been again modest just under +/- 1.3%.
Daily exchange rates
Select chart tabs
Daily swap rates
Select chart tabs
This soil moisture chart is animated here.
Keep abreast of upcoming events by following our Economic Calendar here ».
20 Comments
It feels like the hard data is all bad, but the bank economists and NAct spruiking is going hard out.
Growing bad news coming out of US market, Trump will fire the head of bad data reporting I suspect.
I am sure we do not have clean honest data from China or Russia, Europe is probably most honest, but when things get serious, you just have to lie.
Average Kiwi not buying any of it and wallets are firmly shut even down on the farm where debt reduction or cash hoarding are both doing well, global diary auction fell about 4% NZD did not fall enough to compensate but likely soon.
You are right IT, farmers that I know, including myself, are paying down debt. I also think , given todays events in the USA, things will get grimmer as the Trumpster turns more inward. As in against his own people. With the World events as they are and where USA in the last 50 + years has lead the way, I feel we have the weakest leader ever.
Hold your hats everyone, there is an ill wind rising.
America can feed itself, exports oil, and is very hard to attack due to surrounding seas, I think it will be OK vs others such as China..... few years and us will be able to smelt aussie rare earths and build magnets...
Taiwan chip fab is a risk for them but scorched earth if necessary.
NZ can hardly protect itself from this global turmoil. But we do have our own currency and food security, petrol/diesel supply security is an issue
Big night for Oracle as its stock price appreciated 41% due to the announcement of multiple multibillion-dollar AI cloud contracts, a massive surge in its contracted revenue backlog, and bold forecasts for future AI-driven cloud growth that stunned Wall Street and positioned the company as a critical infrastructure provider for large-scale AI workloads.
Oracle revealed it had secured four major cloud infrastructure contracts during the quarter, including agreements with leading AI firms like OpenAI and xAI, and projected a dramatic 77% increase in cloud infrastructure revenue for the current fiscal year (to $18 billion).
Larry Ellison owns 43% of the company. He only owned 27% of it at the end of 2010, when Oracle was valued at $87 billion (giving him a $24 billion stake).Depending on the pace of buybacks, Ellison could own a majority of Oracle in a few years amidst the AI boom that has been huge for Oracle’s data center business (ORCL is up 5x in past 5 years).
Its all about data, the new oil
Yes. Look at IREN, a vertically integrated data center company started by 2 Aussies and specializes in Bitcoin mining and AI cloud services, all powered by renewable energy sources across Australia, U.S., and Canada.
Stock price going ballistic in past 2 years. Far better performance than BTC or any of the dogsh*t cryptos that people are speculating on. Stock price about USD1 in Dec 2022 and now USD33.
Except it isnt the new oil....though it may seek to consume any we discover
I reckon it's all about water to cool the new oil.
Or extract it
If you move to AKL it never stops f..ken raining, I am not sure water is an issue in NZ. one horse has mud fever and we stable most nights luckily most of our horses.
The People's Bank of China raised its gold holdings by 60,000 ounces to 74.02 million ounces last month from July. By value, gold reserves rose by USD9.9 billion to USD253.8 billion, with gold’s share of China’s total reserves rising to 7.6% from 7.4%, a new high.
https://www.yicaiglobal.com/news/chinas-forex-reserves-jump-to-10-year-…
RIP Charlie Kirk. Great communicator. Such a sad day. His livestream of the US 2024 election as it unfolded was outstanding. It was amusing to flick to the MSM during the election to see how woefully out of touch their talking head reckons and "news" feed was. What a loss to democracy and tragedy for his young family.
Well, he did say that gun deaths were acceptable to preserve the 2nd amendment so I guess he walked the walk.
Well, he did say that some car deaths were acceptable to preserve the freedom of movement, and he drove a car, so I guess he walked the walk.
Would his assassination be any less tragic if he was run down with a car?
“We accept a certain amount of risk for liberty, just like we accept a certain amount of car fatalities because we value the freedom of movement.”
Yeah, guns/cars. Same same.
If demographics are destiny, the destiny of the US looks grim. Where does that leave NZ with it's lower TFR and population peaking in early 2040? If the US is grim what is our description?
"With no migrant arrivals or migrant departures, New Zealand’s population is projected to peak at just under 5.5 million in the early 2040s then slowly decline as deaths outnumber births."
https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/new-zealands-population-likely-to-reach-…
On that forecast, when I die NZs population may be reversing to the ~2m it was when I was born.
"Grim" isn't the first word that comes to my mind. There's also something +ve to be said for living in a smaller village.
At 1.56, yes, tracking to be well below 2 mill. Yes, pluses and minuses. Though, unlike the US, our population is not required to keep the sea lanes open. So probably more irrelevant than grim.
No migrant arrivals is an outlier scenario.
Midpoint is in the article title:
New Zealand's population likely to reach 6 million before 2040
'If demographics are destiny, the destiny of the US looks grim'
At least you said 'if'.
Because we have known for a long time that we are overshot, DC. Try reading 'Men Like Gods' (H G Wells) and Soddy's Wealth, Virtual Wealth and Debt.
The less people the more resources/person. They're going to be richer... relatively... than they would have been if overcrowded.
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.