Bernard Hickey details the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am in association with Bank of New Zealand, including news from America of a slowing economy and a slump in confidence.
The Philadelphia Federal Reserve's survey of activity known as the Philly Fed survey showed a surprise slump in June, while a Bloomberg gauge of economic expectations fell to its weakest level since March 2009.
However, the Dow and S&P 500 measures of US stocks were up slightly in late trade after the slides in recent days, although bank stocks were down heavily on a report that the Basel III process for global bank regulation would force America's Too Big To Fail mega-banks to hold an extra 3% in capital.
Meanwhile, the ASX 200 measure of Australian stocks fell sharply late yesterday on fears about what the European financial crisis might do to global growth prospects. The Nikkei also fell sharply.
Weak British economic data out overnigth dragged the pound and the euro remained soft as Greece's fiscal crisis remained unresolved and the EU and ECB are at loggerheads.
The New Zealand dollar fell along with other 'riskier currencies' to under 80 USc briefly overnight and opened just above the 80 USc mark. The Kiwi also fell vs the Aussie and dipped below 70 on the Trade Weighted Index.
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53 Comments
What the Germans think
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,768786,00.html
maybe we should take a bet on how long before Greece defaults...
1) Panic meetings over the weekend.....so default next week.
2) Its last 2 weeks, so before July 1st
3) Before 1st August
4) before year end.
5) Sometime in 2012
6) Not happening
I'll put GBH into "not happening"...
I think I'll punt on number 2.
regards
All this Greece business is making me nervous.
Could anyone offer me some advice. If Greece defaults, which currencies are likely to get hammered and how will the Kiwi perform in comparison? I'm off to Europe for a long trip soon and wondered when to change money?
I'm off soon too Kate. Last time I went for a while, Lehman's collapsed while I was away. So this time................ ;-)
I spoke to a banker a couple of days ago and they said that their bank doesn't expect the kiwi $ to drop significantly against the USD for 10years. Believe what you will TrimChaiLatte.
I learnt long ago to never trust a banker. We have some minor banking business with the said bank, it's not our main bank. I listen to what they say and make my own decisions. He also told me that if I found a better deposit interest rate at another bank they would match it. I don't do 'dutch auctions'.
With regards to $. In my youth on my OE $1NZ = $1.10+USD. As a farmer I have seen it vary over the years. Also as a farmer the higher payouts have been when the $ is high.
So for me it is about risk management rather than finer details.
Kate, Rather than a lot of cash have you considered the Post Office/kiwi bank cards? You can load up to 5 different currencies on them and use them either like a credit card or at an ATM. Plus you get a spare one in case you lose your first one. Your exchange rate is set to the day you buy the card so you don't have to worry about fluctuating exchange rates while away.
The worlds financial situation has never been the same since the Lehmans crisis Kate. Not that I'm saying it has caused all the problems.
CO i wouldn't be so keen to push those kiwibank currency cards, took one myself to europe a few months ago and pretty much no-one would take it, even atm's.... ended up coming home with plenty of $'s left on it....
Kate, also make sure your cr cards are chip cards as also often denied with a non-chip card... thankfully had a few cr cards up my sleeve!
Could always find an atm that would take it, just not always the first one I tried... was ok in western europe (UK, France etc) but got worse the further east you went.
Is an option for some of their spending $'s but definitley doesn't live up to visa's claim that its accepted worldwide... only sometimes visa.
charges are also quite high for depositing money, I will just be loading up my cr cards for the next trip...
I plan to carry lots of cash and in two currencies.
If one of them is Euros make sure they don't give you Y serial numbers ;-)
On weeks trip to Bali two weeks ago, the Jetstar aircraft on the Singapore legs was only 50-60% full.
It is no surprise to me that they have aircraft grounded because of the ash, they will be keen to see their planes fly full again.
The trip way great for me though, coming back I was able to stretch my lanky frame over four seats to sleep:)
I would certainly be worried about getting home if I were you. Mind you the next two weeks should prove pivotal either way.
Who flogged the copper dome?....I've narrowed it down to somebody in the Chch area who owns a truck and a tarp...someone who had right of entry into the "red zone"....I vote we give Inspector Cloozo a call....it was a dome right...I mean the whole thing looked a bit like a ...well you know...
Fitch gives green light to Greek debt restructuring.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20110616-709430.html
Banks in Germany are now talking about taking a voluntary haircut.
So was the debt overall due to the rich getting richer by using the poor or did most people just get unproductive and simply waste? I will need to look at the numbers?
Should the Greeks accept austerity if simply the money has become unevenly distributed or do they need to change?
Asia’s property boom is stalling
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTBbcaNLccM&feature=player_embedded#at=33
Nigel Farage: Bankers+politicians = 'unholy alliance' vs peoplehttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8580951/Greek-debt-c…
jonlivesey 13 seconds ago I'm afraid a lot of people here are missing the point of the story, and they are simply trotting out their standard stuff about "whose fault", "default", "no default" and so on.Read the headline. What is the name there? Lehman. Why Lehman? Because it is a story about counter-party risk.
Counter-party risk is about a situation in which party A lends to party B, who lends to party C, and so on. There is nothing sinister about these chains of lending; in normal times they work perfectly well.
However, when a big borrower defaults, that hits the financial situation of their lenders. For example, amazingly, Dexia Bank in Belgium has about a quarter of its assets tied up in Greek debt. Imagine what happens to Dexia if Greece defaults.
And if Dexia goes belly-up? That means a bailout of Dexia by the Belgian Government. And that means more Belgian sovereign debt. But, oops, Belgium already has high debt.
And how about French and German Banks with over E100bn exposure to Greek debt. Maybe they'll need a bailout, but oops, both France and Germany already have higher debt than the UK, and have had for decades, so imagine what that does to their creditworthiness.
We could, in the worst case, see a rolling cascade of defaults across Europe as Bank after Bank finds that it is owed large sums by a Banks that just went belly up.
This is not hypothetical. The failure of Credit Anstalt in Austria in 1931 took down dozens of other Banks before the dust settled.
This isn't about taking a side, or cheering the Greeks on to default. This is about your Bank, your pension, your savings, your investments. ReportRecommend
yep....and its worse....CDS's,
Hedge funds etc betting on a default (or not) taking huge asymetrical placements....and these are with US banks....so all of a sudden a default triggers a CDS and lots of them....American banks AIG etc cant meet them and do a Lehman.....the US govn bails them out........
Worst scenario......QE3-4-5-6 are launched all at once in a desperate last ditch shock and awe package, the Republicans block it.......the US collapses into a depression like no other.....US un-employment goes past 30%....they vote in Palin.....the religious nutter declares that since Iran wont pump more oil they are US enemies and nukes them back to the stone age" we all get used to living on bark and berries.....
and yes, our pensions etc are all about to go down the tube.....in 2008 I lost 22% on my main pension...if it loses another 50% soon I wouldnt be surprised....Savings, well they are deposits, of course once the bank system freezes up I wont be able to get at it....investments, Ive cashed out....look like they are 0 to 10%+ down in the last year....glad Im gone.
regards
Yep I have been watching carefully this year for when it might be a prudent move to withdraw and sit on the cash. I think now is that time, afterall I can always put in back in if it blows over for anther 3 months.
Getting USD might be a bit harder, but I will see what the bank will do.
So, silly question of the day: given the current global economic situation, is it a bad idea to have cash in the bank that is not available within 24h?
Namely, would it be wise to swap my Kiwibank "Notive Saver" accounts (32 days & 90 days withdrawal notice, 4.35% & 4.55% interests) for their "online call" account (no notice period, 3.15% interests)? (The reason for having some cash at crap rates is that we are planning to use a good chunk of it soon so I am not interested in tying it up in long-term investments even though the returns may be higher).
As i understand it online call accounts are not technically term deposits therefore are not on loan to the banks to leverage and lose on your behalf if the worst were to happen.
In terms of breaking fixed deposits it will depend on how far advanced your deposit is and how accomodating the friendly banker will be....The policy is half interest only for a break close to term and nil on an early term break.....and so 30 day roll over is an attractive option if your with say ANZ.
You can only draw $500? cash per day....Im not sure how easy it is to draw more...?
However the Govn should/would step in to guarantee deposits, it has to, or runs will kill the banks....so is your money in danger? any more than having it in a firesafe under your bed? a hard q to answer....If the banking system freezes up, will you be able to buy anything even with cash for long?
regards
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