Here's our summary of key economic events overnight that affect New Zealand with news Trump's Gulf War is back in escalation mode with the two belligerents' trading harsh rhetoric. Which of course means no oil is getting through. Kuwait has declared force majeure on its oil exports due to the US blockade.
Financial markets are reacting with caution, but it seems they remain ready to push up with yet another 'relief rally' if things calm down again.
Meanwhile. Canada's CPI inflation returned back to its 2.4% pa level where it has been for six of the past seven months and basically where it was in March 2025. But it is up from the unusual February 1.8% level, caused solely by the rise in energy prices.
And the Bank of Canada released two Q1-2026 expectation survey results. The business version reported improved sentiment, with fewer businesses saying they are being affected by trade tensions with the United States, and many expect sales growth to improve. The consumer one said they became less negative about their spending plans than in the previous quarter as downward pressure from trade tensions eased. All the same, it is still quite negative.
China has held its Loan Prime Rate (LPR) benchmarks at record lows for an 11th straight month in April 2026, matching market expectations. The one-year LPR, the benchmark for most corporate and household borrowing, was held at 3.0%, while the five-year LPR, a benchmark for mortgages, remained at 3.5%.
And China’s exports of electric vehicles, solar cells and lithium-ion batteries surged significantly in March, following a sudden spike in demand for green energy products. Their investment in 'green' non-oil alternatives is really paying off for them.
In Malaysia, their exports rose to a three-month high in March, but the rate of increase was lower at +8.3% from a year ago, compared to 10.7% in February.
In Germany, producer prices, which had been falling on a year-on-year basis since March 2025, were virtually unchanged in March (-0.2%), but they rose +2.5% from February as the oil price spike kicked in.
ECB boss Lagarde says they are uncertain how to react to the two threats of higher inflation from the oil shock, and lower growth prospects that result from that. She said the "double uncertainty about the duration of the shock and the breadth of pass-through argues for gathering more information before drawing firm conclusions for our monetary policy". But she also warned that if governments 'support' consumers with generous programs, their hand could be forced to weigh against the downstream consequences of embedded inflation. She used 2022 examples of how these problems are caused.
And the BIS is warning of the threats of stablecoins. "If widely adopted in their current form, stablecoins would pose policy challenges in areas ranging from credit provision to monetary policy, with risks to financial integrity and regulatory evasion looming large." They will be particularly threatening to the sovereignty of emerging markets, they say.
In Australia, they launched some direct "interest free" loans for certain sectors in their economy to assist them with the very high cost of fuel, logistics, fertilisers and plastics.
And we should probably note that the zinc price has risen to its highest since 2022, and prior to the pandemic, its highest since 2018.
The UST 10yr yield is now just on 4.25%, up +1 bp from this time yesterday. The key 2-10 yield curve is now at +53 bps (-1 bp). Their 1-5 curve is at +21 bps (+1 bp) and the 3 mth-10yr curve is at +59 bps (+1 bp). The China 10 year bond rate is now at 1.76%, down -1 bp. The Japanese 10 year bond yield is down -3 bps at 2.39%. The Australian 10 year bond yield starts today at 4.93%, down -7 bps from yesterday. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate down -8 bps at 4.63%.
Wall Street has opened its week softer with the S&P500 down -0.3%. Overnight, European markets were even softer, down between London's -0.5% and Frankfurt's -1.2%. But yesterday Tokyo closed up +0.6%, Hong Kong was up +0.8% and Shanghai also rose +0.8%. Singapore ended +0.1% firmer, as did the ASX200. The NZX50 also rose a modest +0.1%.
The price of gold will start today down -US$22 at US$4807/oz. Silver is down -US$1 at US$80/oz.
American oil prices are up +US$5 at just over US$89, while the international Brent price is up +US$4.50, and now at US$95/bbl.
The IEA's latest monthly report details the quantum of the Trump Gulf War on the oil market. They say the global oil supply dropped by -10% in March to 97 million barrels per day amid attacks on energy infrastructure in the Middle East and the plunge in shipping traffic through the critical Strait of Hormuz. To mitigate the immediate impact of these supply disruptions, consumers and refiners have tapped oil inventories. However, where stocks cannot fully bridge the gap, demand has taken a hit. Most notably, Asian petrochemical producers have curtailed operating rates as feedstock supply has dried up. Households and businesses using liquefied petroleum gas have also been impacted, while flight cancellations across the Middle East and parts of Asia and Europe have led to a sharp drop in jet fuel consumption. As a result, the report forecasts that global oil demand will contract by -80,000 barrels per day this year. This contrasts with our earlier forecast, before the outbreak of hostilities, that global demand would grow by +850,000.
The Kiwi dollar is up +10 bps from yesterday at this time at 58.9 USc. Against the Aussie we are also up +10 bps at 82.1 AUc. Against the euro we are unchanged at just on 50 euro cents. That all means our TWI-5 starts today also little-changed from yesterday at just over 62.2.
The bitcoin price starts today at US$75,925 and up 1.5% from this time yesterday. Volatility over the past 24 hours has remained modest also at just on +/- 1.5%.
[There will be no video version today.]
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29 Comments
Reading some of Trump's postings this morning the thought that popped into my brain was " fark! He is actually insane" . Delusional stuff. Very frightening.
People have been saying that for a while now. That's why the 25th amendment to the Constitution is being discussed. Many are observing him, coming to the same conclusion as you and realising he needs to be removed. Another group are saying just impeach him. But that won't happen because the Republicans won't do it. Not likely to pass either way as even the 25th Amendment required two thirds majority to pass.
In the meantime he's killing people directly and indirectly. He's doing to the US what their enemies want to do, and they aren't lifting a finger. Long term though the US has lost it's diplomatic clout. Israel though will have that too, but more. I suggest they'll find they have to be more self sufficient post Trump which will bring the threat of a nuke exchange closer.
There are significant ramifications for the UN too as they have demonstrated exactly no ability to prevent any of these conflicts.
Prefer Liz Cheney 2023 “we’re electing idiots.” The checks and balances the founding fathers and the Constitution prudently installed have thus been defeated by a whole bunch of ‘em.
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." Einstein (attr.)
Even more concerning when you place various lenses over The Don. Here's Marina Abramović, high priestess of the elite occult ritual of ‘spirit cooking’, who called Trump “the greatest thing to ever happen to us.”
“Trump is the best thing that has ever happened to us. That he is the magician of the highest order. That he is there in his irrational mind to create confusion in order that the human being can find new order. And you know it’s not so stupid thinking about this in that way. He’s completely turning things upside down.”
Here’s Marina posing with Lord Rothschild. Just a couple of occult cabal heads posing in front of Lucifer.\
The Magician tarot card looks awfully reminiscent of a certain image Trump recently posted..
Probably nothing
Everyone upthread is correct so far - Trump had issues and is sliding further in the direction of insanity.
So far so obvious.
But why Trump and more pertinently, why Trump #2?
Same reason why Brexit, why Arab Spring, why genocide(s). We levered a one-off store of solar energy, went from 1 billion to 8 billion (added 1.4 billion, more than we'd ever managed pre fossil energy, in the mere time I've been commenting here). I billion of us did as much consuming as possible, the rest can't because the planet ain't big enough, and we're currently bumping into the ceiling. Having convinced ourselves that we are superior to nature, we therefore assumed that our superior accounting system and superior societal constructs - like democracy - could overcome all obstacles (including being overshot to the point where we are planet-forcing).
That couldn't be done. So those who tried but failed (the most recent tried-but-failed effort being GND-slash-wellbeing - note the anthropocentric bias of the wellbeing) have been voter-displaced by those who promise - but who obviously cannot re-deliver - the recent paradigm. Of course they will tend to be oddballs; Hegseth, Trump; Goebbels, that's what gets thrown up by societies under stress, wanting their dreams back. Religious believers are a common promise-making type too - as we see closer to home.
We have to look past this. Past Trump (he's temporary), past the disintegration of the US hegemony (it's unstoppable) and look to what we can do to insulate/insure NZ, in real terms (not proxy terms, in other words). One part of that will be distancing ourselves, and re-arranging who we play with during recess.
PDK. As usual you are preaching to the choir. I'd guess you hardly ever encounter thinking people who genuinely disagree with your core proposition that we are an overshot species nor with many of your predictions of the progressive ramifications of that. Which begs the question of why the tendentious repetition.
I don't think of you as choir, your comments suggest perhaps otherwise, at times...
:)
As to repetition, the problem is that until we address thing s differently, we are wasting the remaining time available. That has shortened, logically. I set out to warn, purposely not in a self-reinforcing arena, 20 years ago. That why I'm here. But increasingly, I put my efforts into teaching future-appropriate skills; food-production, infrastructure resilience; materials triage.
My yardstick is simple; Will my grandkids thank me/us for this action, in 20-30-40 years.
I thought your comment was interesting, given I'd just listened to this re Trump Derangement Syndrome...
Has Donald Trump gone mad? | James O'Brien on LBC
My yardstick is simple; Will my grandkids thank me/us for this action, in 20-30-40 years.
Herein lies yet another conundrum: the impact or more and more choosing not to have kids, and the impact on their world view as per your yardstick. Having kids immediately makes one consider their actions and the world their kids will inherit, so will we see less and less empathy and irrational resource usage as a result? Not really looking for an answer here, just food for thought.
Two ends of the stick. Some prudent folk may well ponder their future circumstances and decide that they will not be all that well equipped to nurture and support children sufficient to what they will require to commence adulthood with reasonably good prospects. At the other end unfortunately, there are those in poverty come welfare traps who, in association with the latter, see children as a source of income.
40 years ago, seeing this coming but not as clearly as we do now, we figured our choices were 0, 1, or 2 (the latter being private replacement, but slightly under average replacement). We chose 2, figuring 1 was kinda lonely. They have done ditto - but in hindsight, Catton had already pointed out that we were 'Homo Colossus' in 1980, at 4 billion. So our choice was perhaps optimistic, a few years later.
Not that it matters; the cat is well out of the bag - you could argue that having as many as possible increases the chances of your DNZ surviving the rationalisation to come.
That children-as-income maybe comes from benefit support, but traditionally it was labour - which was energy by any other name.
Hell yes that bangs a sad and rotten bell in human history. For instance the powder monkeys on the Royal Navy man-o-wars or the chimney sweepers in the cities. Boy or girl it didn’t matter long as they were small, some as young as six or eight. Most didn’t stand a chance.
I tend to agree we are seeing early signs of the limits. But this is more about corruption. Worse it's corruption in a country which has touted itself as the bastion and defender of democracy in the world. That corruption has undermined that which they believed they were greatest at - democracy. They did it to themselves. But as their hegemony collapses it will be replaced by another, probably worse, likely Chinese driven. Looking past this will be more of the same but with the Asian twist and not so much democracy and freedom. But even they will have limits. The rise of authoritanism in the US will happen more and more as elites try to preserve their power and privilege. This is about money and wealth and all that goes with it, no matter the facade, fragile and ephemeral that fiat or any other currency is.
Yes Trump or someone like him was inevitable, because the laws and structures they had were not strong enough or rigid enough to curb personal greed and ambition. Unless, and this is a big 'if', whoever replaces Trump is able to install some restoration that holds the politicians to account for their actions and the consequences. The claim that the head of government can do anything they please with the only accountability being the election booth has to be put to bed. Politicians enriching themselves from either the public trough or the exercise of their powers and influence should clearly be illegal with significant consequences. That has to be a part of 'Democracy'.
Has the United States become a rogue state? | DW News
Otherwise agree. Jared Diamond and others have pointed out that all the 'monuments to self' go up in the last hundred years of a civilisation.
The interesting thing about them - the elite wherever - is that their markers are the local proxy. If if fails, they aren't marked.
6ig 6eautiful 6ill
6uild 6ack 6etter
Fight Fight Fight! What number letter in the alphabet is F....
Numbers and letters are not the same
Neil Young - “run, son, numbers add up to nothing.”
Just a coincidence then?
His NYC penthouse is on the 66th floor. Another coincidence?
Dunno, but I don’t at all mind the thread. More than intriguing.
Only for somebody who knows and subscribes to the reference, and is looking for very specific connections to work backward from a conclusion they've already made.
We only have 10 digits available, such irrelevant patterns can be found everywhere if that's what you're in to.
Trump's son in law Jared Kushner has been living at number 666 fifth avenue.
Yet another coincidence?
How many coincidences do you require to wake up?
To what?
That the elite class and world leaders are avid followers of the occult. They operate through deception and use symbolism to communicate amongst themselves
Seems very inefficient no?
I imagine there would be a mountain of communication noise from the millions of others with such vague numerological connections or supposed home addresses.
Corruption has always been part of it.It is as big an industry as crime. Remember reading in “Duel, ” by Thomas Fleming re Burr vs Hamilton, a quote by the latter that corruption had been sewn into the very fabric of the Constitution. Still the USA is hardly unique but it is aggravated by the self righteous posturing that is broadcast.
The choir expands?
https://newsroom.co.nz/2026/04/21/solar-isnt-the-answer-so-what-is/
Soprano to my bass?
Good piece, and it is past time we answered her last question.
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