A review of things you need to know before you sign off on Wednesday; FHBs find buying affordable although a bit less so, dairy prices hold, big LGFA USD bond, Aussie PMIs suffer price pressures, swaps stable, NZX stable, NZD soft, & 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
Kāinga Ora has raised all its home loan rates today, including its floating rate (from the lasty OCR). It's fixed rates are up between +16 bps and +40 bps. 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
None here today. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here. (Maybe this isn't a friendly thing to do, but we can point out that the best savings rate in Australia is currently 6.00%, a welcome (new client) rate offer by ING. And Bank Australia has a 5.50% one year term deposit rate offer. Just saying.)

AFFORDABLE, BUT GOING THE WRONG WAY AGAIN
Rising mortgage rates are now more than offsetting falling house prices at the affordable end of the housing market. That has turned the home loan affordability index slightly worse in August. Despite that, every province except Auckland has affordable first homes even when purchased with a 10% deposit. With a 20% deposit, every city is affordable now, with the exceptions of Auckland's North Shore, and Queenstown.

DAIRY PRICES HOLD
Overnight there was a Pulse dairy auction where prices dipped marginally in USD except for SMP, but were all higher in NZD, although this too was only marginal. AMF dipped -0.1% in USD but rose +0.7% in NZD. Butter fell -0.5% in USD but rose +0.2^% in NZD. SMP was up +0.3% in USD, up +1.1% in NZD. WMP dipped -0.2% in USD but rose +0.6% in NZD. All changes are from the prior week's full auction results.

NZX50 SOFTISH
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index is down -0.1% so far. But for the past 5 trading sessions it is up +1.5%. It is up +7.3% from six months ago. From a year ago it is now up +5.4%. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is down -0.7% so far today. Investore Property, Napier Port, Genesis, and Summerset rise while Gentrack, Kathmandu, Meridian, and Mainfreight decline.

MORE BIG BOND ISSUANCE
The LGFA is raising US$500 mln in a 5 year bond, rated AA+, with a yield of 4.961% pa.

EASING OFF AS PRICES RISE
The flash S&P Global factory PMI in Australia saw a shift from a moderate expansion in August (52.0) to a minor contraction in September (49.3). Their services sector eased as well but is still expanding in September. On the prices front, the rate of input price inflation picked up to its highest in three months, but remained weaker than seen through the second quarter. Meanwhile, output charges rose at a strong rate that was more pronounced than in August. 

'GROWING NORMALLY' (?)
World growth is holding up well in the face of the energy price shock, but real interest rates are rising, Fitch Ratings says in its latest Global Economic Outlook. Fitch has raised its forecast for global GDP growth in 2026 by 0.2pp to 2.6%, down only marginally from 2025 and close to the long-run trend.

SWAPS LITTLE-CHANGED
Wholesale swap rates will likely be little-changed-to-soft today. Keep an eye on our chart below which will record the final positions closer to 5pm. The RBNZ 90 day rate was unchanged at 3.17% on Tuesday. Today, the Australian 10 year bond yield has dipped another -2 bps to 5.25%. The China 10 year bond rate is still at 1.67%. The Japanese 10 year bond is still at 2.98% while they are on holiday. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is now at 4.95% and down -2 bps from Tuesday. (The RBNZ 10 year rate is 'prior day' and was unchanged again at 4.95% on Tuesday.) And the UST 10yr yield is now at 4.96%, and up +3 bps from yesterday.

EQUITIES IN ONLY MINOR MOVES
The NZX50 is now just down -0.1% from yesterday's close. The ASX200 has opened little-changed. Tokyo is closed for a holiday today. The KOSPI has risen +0.2% at its open today, minor for them. Hong Kong has opened down -0.8% while Shanghai is down -0.3% at its open. Singapore is down -0.1% in early Wednesday trade today. Wall Street ended little-changed on the S&P500.

OIL PRICES LOWER
American oil prices are down -US$3.50 from yesterday with the WTI benchmark now at just over US$89.50/bbl, while the international Brent price is just under US$98.50/bbl and down -US$3/bbl.

CARBON PRICE ON HOLD
There have been no trades reported today, so far. The price is still at $52.50/NZU. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.

GOLD STABLE
In early Asian trade, gold is down a minor -US$7/oz from this time yesterday, now at US$4335/oz. Silver is up +50 USc at US$66.50/oz.

NZD DIPS
The Kiwi dollar is down -20 bps from yesterday, now at 57.1 USc. Against the Aussie we are down -20 bps at 80.2 AUc. Against the euro we still at just on 49.9 euro cents, down -10 bps. This all means the TWI-5 is remains just under 60.6 and down -20 bps from yesterday.

BITCOIN LITTE-CHANGED
The bitcoin price is now at US$86,438 and up +0.9% from this morning. Volatility has been low at just on +/- 0.9%.

HOW THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC FORCES AFFECT US
If you want to catch up on what happened last night, try our Economy Watch podcast, here.

This soil moisture chart is animated here.

Keep abreast of upcoming events by following our Economic Calendar here ».