Here's my summary of the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am, including news dairy commodity prices fell 5.3% overnight.
This decline in the Fonterra auction in US dollars was the third straight since the middle of April and is a fall of 14% since then. In NZ dollars however the drop is not so much but it is still almost a 9% retreat.
The falling NZ dollar is mitigating some of the pricing shift. It is worth noting that a similar fall happened last year at a similar time.
The OECD's latest report on New Zealand is broadly positive confirming our economy is gaining momentum. But they do make a number of structural recommenations and Bernard Hickey has the details here ยป
In Australia, even though it held its fire yesterday and opted for caution, the RBA said it still has room to cut its benchmark interest rate from its record-low level and it noted the Aussie exchange rate remains too high high, despiter its biggest monthly drop since 2011.
The US trade deficit widened in April from a more than three year low, reflecting a rebound in imports of consumer goods and business equipment and that helped ease concerns about the degree of slowing in American economic growth.
Gold has fallen back below US$1,400/oz and oil has settled lower as well. Equities are down more than half a percent in mid-day trade.
The NZ dollar starts today at 79.9 USc, 83.0 AUc, and our TWI is down to 75.0.
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