Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today.
Auckland's largest real estate firm Barfoot & Thompson is reporting more sales of houses in the under $500,000 bracket, suggesting that banks may be starting to ease up a little on would-be buyers with low deposits. And Barfoot and Thompson's managing director Peter Thompson said with listings at low levels at the end of January, he was expecting more pressure on the city's house prices this year.
Statistics New Zealand has reported the unemployment rate fell to 6.0% in the December quarter from 6.2% in the September quarter, while there were 24,000 jobs added and labour costs rose 0.5% in the quarter. The participation rate moved up to 69.3% (68.9% seasonally-adjusted).
In the fast-developing saga involving the deteriorating relationship between Trade Me and real estate agents, the Commerce Commission has said it is investigating the decisions by groups of real estate agency offices in Hamilton and Hawkes Bay to withdraw more than 1,700 listings from Trade Me Property over the last three weeks.
The exchange rate has moved up strongly during the day, with the Kiwi dollar rising from early today to US82.49c (from US81.94c), to A92.40c (from A91.70c) and to 77.9 on the TWI from 77.36.
Swap rates have moved during the day about 4bps on two-to-five year rates and 5bps on seven and 10 years. The 90-day bank bill rates rose to 2.89% from 2.87%.
ANZ has also cut its credit card balance transfer rate today, matching the 1% rate earlier adopted by BNZ and Westpac.
Latest home loan approvals figures from the Reserve Bank for the week ended January 31 showed that the number approved, 6061, was down 4.3% on the comparable week a year ago - which is a slower rate of decline in numbers than has been present in other weeks following the October 1 introduction of LVR speed limits. Year-on-year comparative figures have often tended to be around 10% down since the LVR limits were introduced. The latest figures - while only one week - may suggest therefore that banks may be getting more comfortable with the limits and freeing up their lending a little.
General Finance has raised its term deposit rates for all terms 18 months to 5 years, raising them from 15 bps to 25 bps.
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