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
ICBC cut its six month fixed rate to 4.39% almost matching the Bank of China's market-low 4.38%. All current mortgage 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
Southern Cross Partners cut their 1 and 2 year rates to 5.75% today. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.
UPGRADE FOR SBS BANK
Fitch Ratings has upgraded SBS Bank's credit rating to BBB+ from BBB citing improvement in SBS's capital ratios, which Fitch expects to be maintained over the next two years. (See credit ratings explained here). This upgraded rating puts them on par with both Co-operative bank and TSB.
SEEKING CONSISTENCY
The Commerce Commission has finalised new information disclosure rules for local councils and water organisations that deliver water supply and wastewater services. These rules introduce consistent public reporting so consumers can more clearly see how their local water service provider is performing and understand how money is being spent.
TAKE A BREAK, DO OUR QUIZ
Our quiz has been updated for this week's edition. You can do it here. And a new one will be added every Monday.
LOOKING AHEAD TO THE GDT PULSE AUCTION
Tomorrow's dairy Pulse auction is expected (by the derivatives market pricing) to bring another surge in SMP prices, raising these USD prices back to 2022 levels. The WMP pricing won't be so bullish however.
NZX50 UP AGAIN
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index is up +0.4% so far today. But that still puts it up +3.2% over the past five working days. It is now up +3.0% from six months ago. From a year ago it is now up +7.5%. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is up +5.3% so far today. In fact, the NZX50 gains are being led by F&P Healthcare, Sanford, Channel Infrastructure and Tourism Holdings while Genesis, Chorus, Serko and Investore Property fall away.
TRACKING DEATHS
In Australia, they have just found that 2025 had the highest level of flu deaths since 2000. Extended mortality tracking showed Australian deaths involving COVID-19 remain at very low levels, with just 53 deaths in November and 52 in December. But deaths involving influenza remain unseasonably high, with 95 deaths in November and 119 in December. During 2025, Covid-related deaths peaked in July at 360, while influenza deaths peaked in the same month at 328.
CHINA HOLDS
And the Chinese central bank left its benchmark lending rates unchanged for a ninth consecutive month in February, in line with what market expected, and that seems to show policymakers are not rushing to introduce broad monetary easing after their other recent targeted measures.
SWAP RATES HOLD
Wholesale swap rates are probably little-changed to marginally softer today. 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 2.49% on Monday. Today, the Australian 10 year bond yield is down -1 bp at 4.71%. The China 10 year bond rate is down -2 bps at 1.79%. The Japanese 10 year bond is down -1 bp at 2.09% today. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is now at 4.38%, down -2 bps from this time yesterday. The RBNZ data is now 'prior day' with Monday's rate up +2 bps at 4.36%. The UST 10yr yield is down -4 bps from yesterday, now just on 4.04%.
EQUITIES MIXED
The local equity market has gained again in Tuesday trade, up +0.7% so far. However, the ASX200 is down by -0.2% in afternoon trade. Tokyo is up +0.6% in its opening trade. Hong Kong is down -1.6% but Shanghai has returned from holiday up +1.0%. Singapore is down -0.6%. Wall Street was down -1.0% on the S&P500 at the end of its Monday trade.
OIL RISES SLIGHTLY
American oil prices are back up +50 USc at just under US$66.50/bbl, while the international Brent price is over US$72.50/bbl.
CARBON PRICE RISES
There have been more trades but small ones today on the secondary market, but the price has pushed up to $47/NZU. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.
GOLD FIRMS AGAIN
In early Asian trade, gold has risen from this time yesterday, up +US15/oz and now at US$5172/oz. Silver is down -US$ at just under US$86/oz.
NZD DIPS
The Kiwi dollar is back down -0 bps from this time yesterday against the USD, now at just on 59.6 USc. Against the Aussie we are down -20 bps at 84.4 AUc. Against the euro we down -10 bps at 50.6 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is now just on 63.1 and down -20 bps from this morning.
BITCOIN SLIPS
The bitcoin price is now at US$64,191 and down a minor -0.4% from this time yesterday. Volatility has been moderate at +/- 2.1%.
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11 Comments
A single Substack post has sent markets tumbling [https://www.citriniresearch.com/p/2028gic]. WSJ picks up on it. General drift is the "human intelligence displacement spiral”: companies use AI to cut staff, workers lose income, consumption falls, which then pressures the same companies further. AI boosts measured output and margins, but machines don’t consume, so a rising share of “output” never recirculates as household demand.
The scenario focuses heavily on workflow/SaaS and “Phase 1” AI beneficiaries (e.g., large software and cloud names) as both drivers and eventual victims of AI automation. It describes a reflexive loop where automation vendors (like ServiceNow) see customers cut headcount and thus software seats, while simultaneously using savings to fund more advanced AI that cannibalizes the original products.
https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-dow-sp-500-nasdaq-t…
AI does not need property (read mortgages) , insurance , food or common services so yeah it will kill the consumer service based economy. Its no wonder the market is failing to see the good side of AI once deployed.
While companies desperately deploy AI to cut their bottom lines (read staff costs) , there top lines will collapse as the fired workers at other companies stop purchasing their services. Ask any CTO they see it , but as every other company and HO are doing it they have to follow. Many companies profits are the 20-30% of revenues the rest being costs... welcome to a world of no returns.
Many people predicted a great reset, but not almost free intelligence.
You have to admit it relies on intelligence to harness the intelligence though. Perhaps in your area of expertise (IT / Banking?) it may reduce the number of staff but many areas won't be affected to the same level, such as health, education (teachers), police, hospitality, agriculture, horticulture, although for the latter two it could improve performance/productivity.
I disagree AI is going to make the best tutor ever, personal tutor for free, say good by to those after hours kids tutoring companies!.
but if it knows law so well why fight it?
do you want to be judged by a jury of AI or represented by one?
Police for sure but its evidence gathering in an electronic world will be amazing
health is a total takeover... and it will be able to monitor body signs in real time!
hospo i just do not know I already hate local ai on phone reservations - looking at you shed16 in kaukoppakoppa! yes its answering the phone barely 10km from me..
agri - ai flight paths for gorse sprayers etc... if a human does it now ai will do it better inside 5 years driving tractors etc
which will leave me more time to go fishing, where i am not sure ai will be better, tho i am considering a side gig in this space as people will have more time for it
looking at you shed16 in kaukoppakoppa! yes its answering the phone barely 10km from me.
Sorry, what?
if you ring the restaurant / pub and they are busy an ai agent answers the calls and tries to help vs a human, it was not a great experience.... designed to help you modify bookings i guess but thats only 10km from my home and ai already tring to replace a human
so hospo is vulnerable as well
I am not going to let AI choose my beer though
I am somewhat of a liar here, i am asking ai for help with homebrew all grain brewing , its useful in beer design
With the fishing it should be able to identify the rivers (I fly fish, SI back country) that the guides are fishing, when they post their videos online. So that's a positive for me, as the arseholes have ruined some of my go to rivers, and AI might enable me to fish theirs. That aside, most of your points above are enhancing, not necessarily replacing staff, perhaps some retraining required, but not the doom and gloom you're promoting.
You are probably not as close to AI as I am, I run core systems for a large NZ company, it's past intern level and approaching average employee knowledge, My developers will become more productive they will be around a while, but no more junior jobs will be opened.
I see teams of 10 in other areas going to 2 or 3 in that many years
I do not understand why this is not an election issue, perhaps like the frog in a pot people do not know what is coming, trade your portfolio accordingly.
I also fish , smaller rivers into Taupo.. at least we will have more time to fish!
I'm semi retired, doing some contract finance work, so plenty of time to fish. I hope you dont get the pressure we're getting from guides and their clients, with heaps of $'s, so they can chopper into a pool ahead of you, fish it, then jump a km or two above you.
I think AI will create more jobs than it replaces, perhaps different jobs, and will also improve performance and production. NZ may loose some of its competitive advantage with ag and hort though.
please read the sub stack people on this site, its grim but likely the playbook here is an example, its just pretend but imho this isvery close to the future that I see.
The Daisy Chain of Correlated Bets
Private credit had grown from under $1 trillion in 2015 to over $2.5 trillion by 2026. A meaningful share of that capital had been deployed into software and technology deals, many of them leveraged buyouts of SaaS companies at valuations that assumed mid-teens revenue growth in perpetuity.
Those assumptions died somewhere between the first agentic coding demo and the Q1 2026 software crash, but the marks didn’t seem to realize they were dead.
As many public SaaS companies traded to 5-8x EBITDA, PE-backed software companies sat on balance sheets at marks reflecting acquisition valuations on multiples of revenue that didn’t exist anymore. Managers eased the marks down gradually, 100 cents, 92, 85, all while public comps said 50.
MOODY’S DOWNGRADES $18B OF PE-BACKED SOFTWARE DEBT ACROSS 14 ISSUERS, CITING ‘SECULAR REVENUE HEADWINDS FROM AI-DRIVEN COMPETITIVE DISRUPTION’; LARGEST SINGLE-SECTOR ACTION SINCE ENERGY IN 2015 | Moody’s Investors Service, April 2027
Everyone remembers what happened after the downgrade. Industry veterans had already seen the playbook following the 2015 energy downgrades.
Software-backed loans began defaulting in Q3 2027. PE portfolio companies in information services and consulting followed. Several multi-billion dollar LBOs of well-known SaaS companies entered restructuring.
Zendesk was the smoking gun.
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