Bernard Hickey details the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am in association with Bank of New Zealand, including news that Fitch Ratings has downgraded New Zealand's sovereign credit rating from AA+ to AA.
Fitch said New Zealand's poor savings rate and heavy foreign borrowing showed little signs of turning around and further structural reforms were needed.
See the the full article on the Fitch downgrade here.
This is the first sovereign credit rating downgrade for New Zealand in 13 years and will prove a warning shot over the govenrment, which yesterday borrowed a record-equalling NZ$1 billion in a single bond auction.
See Alex Tarrant's article on the record bond issue here.
The New Zealand dollar fell sharply after the announcement.
It fell as much as 1 USc to 76.5 USc before recovering some of its losses to be over 77 USc by 9 am. See more in BNZ's currencies report here.
Meanwhile, the German Parliament overwhelmingly approved a previous plan to increase the size of Europe's bailout fund, helping spark a rally of around 1.5% in European stocks and a rise in the euro. See more here at Reuters.
However, the real work of approving a so-called 'bazooka' plan to vastly increase the size of the fund has yet to be agreed and there remain significant hurdles to jump before Europe's financial crisis has calmed.
US stocks were mixed with tech stocks falling after a profit downgrade by chipmaker AMD.
See more in BusinessDesk's market report.
The Dow closed up 1.3% and the S&P 500 ended up 0.8%, but the Nasdaq closed down 0.4%/
(Updated with links to reports and detail on US stocks close)
No chart with that title exists.
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.