A review of things you need to know before you go home Wednesday; Productivity Commission's report; R&D spending growth positive; tertiary academics under pressure to lower standards; Trump's wall faces funding pressures; local swap rates up; NZD lower

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

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
SBS Bank has raised its floating mortgage rates by +14 bps, from 5.65% to 5.79%.

DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
Heretaunga Building Society has raised its 1 yr term deposit rate by +10 bps to 3.70%.

SUBSTANTIAL OVERHAUL REQUIRED
The Productivity Commission’s final report on improving urban planning in New Zealand has highlighted the need for far-reaching change to avoid further harmful effects of spiralling house prices and infrastructure shortfalls. The report makes 64 recommendations ranging from changes at the central government to the local council levels, details of which can be found here.

RESEARCH SPENDING GROWS
The spending on research and development (R&D) grew by $531 mln (20%) from 2014 to 2016 and represents 1.28% of GDP or $3.2 bln. This is a big improvement from the 2014 survey, which showed a rise of just 2% from the 2012 levels and as a percentage of GDP the level fell from 1.25% to 1.17%. The improvement in R&D spending was led by a $125 mln increase in computer services, $105 mln in machinery and equipment manufacturing and $143 mln in the tertiary sector. The R&D spend split between business, government and tertiary sectors is 50%, 20% and 30% respectively.

INCREASED PRESSURE TO LOWER EDUCATION STANDARDS
A survey of 1,006 academics (number of respondents out of the roughly 10,000 members), conducted by Tertiary Education Union, has highlighted the increasing pressure to pass students in response to rising completion rate requirements imposed by their managers and departments, including pressure to inflate grades and make assessments easier. This pressure was much worse at the institute of technology and polytechnic institutions as opposed to universities, with 71.7% and 57.1% of the respondents, respectively, saying the pressure was worse than it was ten years ago. The respondents also reported increasing pressure to admit students who did not meet the minimum requirements for the respective courses.

TRUMP'S BORDER WALL
Republicans in the US Congress are considering delaying their decision on President Trump's request to fund a wall along the Mexican border, one of Trump's major campaign promises. The Republicans have said that the spending bill that must be passed by April 28, to fund federal agencies whose funding expires then, is more easily managed without the wall, and that funding for the wall would be better considered at a later time. The Democrats, on the other hand, are threatening to block the funding bill if it includes a budget for the wall.

WHOLESALE RATES RISE
Wholesale swap rates curve steepened today, with 1 yr, 2 yr, 5 yr and 10 yr rates rising 1 bps, 2 bps, 3 bps and 4 bps respectively. The 90 day bank bill was also up by 1 bps to 1.99%.

NZ DOLLAR LOWER
The NZD had declined against the USD today, from 70.5 USc this morning it tested lows of 69.2 USc multiple times before trading at the current levels just above the 70.0 USc mark. On the cross rates we are also lower against the AUD and EUR to trade at 91.7 AUc and 64.8 euro cents. The TWI-5 is now at 74.9.

You can now see an animation of this chart. Click on it, or click here.