A review of things you need to know before you go home on Tuesday; no retail rate changes, business confidence slips, auction activity drops, mortgage demand high, KiwiSaver balances rise sharply, swaps stable, NZD slips, & more

Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today.

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
No changes to report today.

TERM DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
None here today either.

BUSINESS CONFIDENCE FALLS, INFLATION EXPECTATIONS RISE
The ANZ Business Outlook survey preliminary results for March show business confidence has fallen but businesses still expect to increase their prices and see inflation of close to 2% in a year's time; construction 'took a hit'.

AUCTION ACTIVITY DIPS
Barfoot & Thompson's Auckland auction numbers may have peaked at the end of February.

TWO DIFFERENT TRACKS
Credit bureau Centrix says applications for new credit cards are down -40% since before the onset of COVID. However mortgage demand is going through the roof although mortgage arrears are rising too.

HALFWAY TO $100 MLN
Community Finance, an investment platform to build affordable homes, has launched The Aotearoa Pledge – looking to raise $100 mln in 2021 to tackle New Zealand’s housing shortage. $51 mln has already been raised towards the target with commitment to the pledge from ANZ Bank, Generate KiwiSaver Scheme, Pathfinder Asset Management, Forsyth Barr, the Lindsay Foundation, Clare Foundation and Waikato’s WEL Energy Trust.

TRUCKING ON
ANZ says its truckometer report shows the Light Traffic Index (cars) rose +1% in February, while the Heavy Traffic (freight trucks) rose +2% from January. Both traffic indexes are higher than a year ago (by more than +4%), but the overshoot continues to dissipate gradually. "But while there’s light at the end of the tunnel, the New Zealand economy has some hard yards in front of it yet," ANZ says. "The cumulative damage to tourism and related sectors of the closed border is starting to show, and the housing and construction boom may be starting to hit its limits."

UP SHARPLY
As at the end of 2020, the total value of all KiwiSaver accounts rose to $77.2 bln, a rise of +18% in a year. Most of this will be new contributions (+$6.4 bln), but investment gains grew too (+$5.3 bln). 51% of these assets are New Zealand based, and 63% are in equities (58.5% of the New Zealand assets, 68% of the offshore assets). We now have 24.3% of GDP saved into all KiwiSaver accounts. That is up from 21.6% in 2019.

STRONG AUSSIE BUSINESS CONFIDENCE
In Australia, business confidence has risen to its highest level in eleven years, driven by better business conditions as companies begin to hire and invest in new capacity.

GOLD TURNS DOWN
Gold is trading in Australia, and soon in Asian markets. So far today it is at US$1683 and down -US$25 from this time yesterday. It is currently similar to where it closed in New York and -US$4 below where it closed in London.

EQUITIES GENERALLY HIGHER
Wall Street fell away sharply at the end of its trading session earlier today with the S&P500 ending down -0.5%. It had been up +1% earlier in the session but was weighed down by sentiment for tech stocks. The NASDAQ is falling hard and is down more than -10% since mid-February. Tokyo has opened up +0.3%, and Hong Kong has opened up +0.4%. But Shanghai has opened down -2.3%, taking the drop over the past 18 days to -8.4% and getting close to a formal "correction" (ie -10%). Worth keeping an eye on too. Meanwhile, the ASX200 is up +0.9% in early afternoon trade and the NZX50 Capital Index is up a minor +0.1%.

SWAP & BONDS RATES HOLD HIGH
We don't have today's closing swap rates yet. If there are movements today, we will note them here later when we get the data. But they likely little-changed. Today the 90 day bank bill rate is unchanged at 0.32%. The Australian Govt ten year benchmark rate is up +1 bp today at 1.80%. The China Govt ten year bond is marginally lower at 3.27%. The New Zealand Govt ten year is staying higher, up +2 bps at 1.92%. But that is now slightly higher than the earlier RBNZ fixing at 1.91% (unchanged). The US Govt ten year has slipped -1 bp from this time yesterday at 1.57%.

NZD LOWER
The Kiwi dollar is now at 71.1 USc and more than -½c lower than this time yesterday. On the cross rates we are holding 93.2 AUc. Against the euro we have slipped to 60 euro cents. That all means our TWI-5 is slightly lower at just under 73.5.

BITCOIN MOVING HIGHER AGAIN
The price of bitcoin is rising further today, now at US$53,255 and up a further +3.2% from this time yesterday. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been a relatively high +/- 4.3%.

This soil moisture chart is animated here.

The easiest place to stay up with event risk today is by following our Economic Calendar here ».