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
The Cooperative Bank has followed ANZ lower on fixed rates. All current mortgage rates are here. And note, you can compare mortgage offers with our unique calculator that takes into account other costs and cashback incentives, here.
TERM DEPOSIT/SAVINGS RATE CHANGES
The Coop Bank and Heartland have both trimmed some rates today. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.
EASIER TO COME
The Government is touting the success of making it easier for Chinese visitors to arrive from Australia. They can now use the NZeTA visa system which is 'faster' and cheaper. In the six months since this option was available to Chinese visitors, 90,000 have applied and 79,000 have already arrived. Instead of spending $441 for a visitor visa and waiting an average of 4 days, people from China travelling via Australia can pay as little as $117 and have their request for an NZeTA processed in less than 3 days. (The system also applies to similar visitors from the Pacific Forum countries, but only 2000 from there have applied and only 1000 have already arrived.)
LOWER OCR HIKING PRESSURE
Westpac has trimmed back its OCR hiking forecast for 2026/2027. The early resolution of the Iran war implies a weaker inflation outlook and an earlier economic recovery. They now say the RBNZ is expected to begin raising the OCR in September but only tighten once more in 2026. The OCR will peak at 4% at the end of 2027 they now forecast, and it will return to a neutral 3.75% at the end of 2028.
TOP UPS ARE WHERE THE ACTION IS
There were mortgage top-ups worth $1.06 bln in May, the most since November 2021 according to updated data released today by the RBNZ. That extends a run to three months where the number of top up mortgage lending averages 10,000 per month or more. That is way more than the average 7200 per month in the prior three years. The house is still an ATM for many. (And some banks are incentivising top-ups although with limits far lower than the $101,000 average in this latest data.)
RESPONSIBLE BORROWING?
Mortgage lending to first home buyers was little-changed in May at $1.68 bln for the month to 2875 borrowers. These are not special levels in any way. They are now borrowing an average of $584,000 and that is lower than the $599,000 peak in January, or the $595,000 in December 2021. FHB's are hardly borrowing anything significantly more these days.
FUEL SITUATION UPDATE
If oil prices keep falling and supply through the Strait of Hormuz eases as expected, this may be our final update in this series. We will reprise it if the situation worsens.
| Stock, days cover | Number of ships | Petrol | Diesel | Jet fuel |
| In-country | 32.3 | 22.0 | 26.7 | |
| On water within EEZ (up to 2 days away) | 5 | 8.1 | 10.3 | 11.2 |
| On water outside EEZ (up to 3 weeks away) | 8 | 13.8 | 13.4 | 13.1 |
| Total NZ stock, June 21, 2026 | 13 | 54.1 | 45.7 | 51.0 |
| previously reported | ||||
| In-country | 33.1 | 23.0 | 30.5 | |
| On water within EEZ (up to 2 days away) | 2 | 5.6 | 0.0 | 10.0 |
| On water outside EEZ (up to 3 weeks away) | 9 | 12.9 | 25.0 | 14.3 |
| Total NZ stock, June 17, 2026 | 11 | 51.7 | 48.0 | 54.8 |
| previously reported | ||||
| In-country | 36.3 | 26.3 | 32.9 | |
| On water within EEZ (up to 2 days away) | 3 | 5.6 | 0.1 | 10.0 |
| On water outside EEZ (up to 3 weeks away) | 9 | 12.9 | 25.0 | 14.3 |
| Total NZ stock, June 14, 2026 | 12 | 54.8 | 51.4 | 57.2 |
NZX50 RISES
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index is up +0.7%, with a weekly rise now of +1.0%. It is down -0.2% from six months ago. From a year ago it is now up +8.3%. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is up a strong +3.3% so far today. Tourism Holdings leads Thursday's rebound while Spark, F&P Healthcare and a2 Milk extend their gains; Kathmandu, Serko, Scales and Summerset weaken however.
GOOD DEMAND, LOWER YIELDS
There were three maturities offered in today's NZGB tender that had $450 mln available. That attracted 94 bids worth $1.564 mln and a little under half the bids won something. All the yields were lower than at the prior equivalent events.
MORE PEOPLE WORKING MORE HOURS, BUT MORE PART-TIME WORK
The Australian labour market data in May shows +40,300 more people were employed, taking their employed workforce to 14,739,000. But 35,200 of those extra jobs were part-time roles. Their jobless rate fell to 4.4% from 4.5% in April and 4.8% in May 2025. But their monthly hours worked ticked up +2.2% from a year ago.
A QUICK RETRACING
The top has suddenly come off the aluminium price with it falling to early January 2026 levels again. It is down -17% from its June 2 recent peak (and didn't exceed its March 2022 record high..
SWAP RATES LOWER
Wholesale swap rates will likely be lower again 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 2.72% on Wednesday. Today, the Australian 10 year bond yield is down -4 bps at 4.73%. The China 10 year bond rate is down -1 bp at 1.73%. The Japanese 10 year bond is down -5 bps at 2.63% today. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is now at 4.37%, down -6 bps from this time yesterday. (The RBNZ data is now 'prior day' with the Wednesday rate down -4 bp at 4.38%.) The UST 10yr yield is down -7 bps at 4.40%.
EQUITIES MIXED
The local equity market is firmer from yesterday, up +0.7%. The ASX200 is down -0.3% so far, however. Tokyo has opened up +3.9% on the very strong Micron result. Hong Kong is has retreated -0.9% but Shanghai is up +0.3% at its open today. Singapore is unchanged. Wall Street ended its Wednesday session down -0.1% and the Nasdaq was down -0.4%.
OIL PRICES RETREAT FURTHER
American oil prices are down -US$2.50 from yesterday with the WTI benchmark now just on US$69.50/bbl, while the international Brent price is just on US$72.50/bbl. Anticipated excess supply is colliding with lower demand.
CARBON PRICE HOLDS
There has been a few trades today and the price has basically held at $54.80/NZU. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.
GOLD FALLS
In early Asian trade, gold is down another -US$79/oz from this yesterday and falling, now at US$3980/oz. Silver is down -US$4.50 at just under US$57/oz.
NZD DIPS AGAIN
The Kiwi dollar has retreated another -10 bps from this time yesterday against the USD, now just on 56.4 USc. Against the Aussie we are also down -10 bps at 81.8 AUc. Against the euro we down -10 bps too at 49.6 euro cents. This all means the TWI- is now just over 60.3 and down another -20 bps from this time yesterday, and its lowest since November 2025.
BITCOIN DOWN
The bitcoin price is now at US$60,688 and down -3.0% from this time yesterday. Volatility has been high at just on +/- 3.1%.
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3 Comments
Team Albo has had to back down again on its cunning plan to restrain the Aussie Ponzi.
This time they had to back down to prevent existing investment properties from losing grandfathered exemptions from the changes to capital gains tax and negative gearing if one of the owners dies or there is a divorce. Naturally there were howls of protest from the public.
The AFR has estimated that around 680,000 properties acquired before the budget would have been at risk of losing their grandfathered treatment in scenarios of death or divorce.
https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/government-to-dump-widows-tax-in-l…
'We will reprise it if the situation worsens'
Nothing like long-term thinking, eh?
The Canadian govt plan to buy empty condos and turn them into affordable housing in British Columbia might be more about stabilizing the financial sector than housing, an urban planning expert says.
“If prices are set too high for condo units to be sold, market forces will cause the prices to lower until people can afford them,” she said in a statement. “But if developers know that the government will simply bail them out if the condos sit vacant long enough, they will never drop their prices, making the housing crisis even worse.”
“Now, with this type of housing coming online, the market should allow prices to naturally come down,” he said.
It could also set a precedent for other industries to ask for financial help from the public purse, Yan said.
https://cheknews.ca/plan-to-buy-b-c-condos-might-be-more-about-stabiliz…
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