A review of things you need to know before you go home Wednesday; ANZ cuts two home loan rates, REINZ reports sales slide, Nash moves on online GST, RBNZ slaps Westpac, swaps down, NZD holds

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

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
ANZ has cut home loan rates for two terms. It cut -10 bps for one year fixed taking its 'special' rate down to 4.45%, and it cut its two year 'special' by -4 bps to 4.65%.

DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
No changes to report today.

SLIDING SALES VOLUMES
The REINZ reported its October sales outcomes today, and they were soft as expected. Median house prices are lower in Auckland, Northland, Bay of Plenty, Taranaki, Wellington, Tasman and Nelson. It has been a difficult start to summer for the housing market with sales volumes down -16% in October from the same month a year ago, and they are down -23% in Auckland. That is the sort of decline we have been getting in Auckland since April. In fact, year-on-year volume changes have been negative since October 2015 (with one very minor exception in May 2016). This downward volume pressure is now telling on pricing. Auckland median prices have been essentially flat for 20 months. No region in the whole country is reporting volume growth.

RETAILERS 1, CONSUMERS 0
Local retailers have a friend in the new Revenue Minister. Stuart Nash said today that the Government will move to ensure GST is collected on all online transactions with overseas suppliers. He said that the current situation gave an unfair advantage to overseas sellers over New Zealand retailers.

WINNING JOURNALISM
In case you hadn't noticed earlier, both Gareth Vaughan and Jenee Tibshraeny won their categories in the NZSA Business Journalism Awards last night. We are all smiles here today.

EYE WATERING
We have done a comparison of what the payday loan industry charges as effective finance costs, as equivalent % pa.

MANAGEMENT CHURN
Yet another NZ bank CEO is leaving. Rabobank NZ says CEO Daryl Johnson has resigned and a search is underway for his replacement. By our count that is the fifth bank CEO change in the past few weeks, and of course the RBNZ is also looking for a new permanent Governor. All this activity follows a long period of relative stability at the top of these organisations.

DISAPPOINTING BREACH
Westpac has been caught with a dodgy capital adequacy model, meaning it has breached its banking licence with the RBNZ. Everyone is 'very disappointed', and the RBNZ has raised its capital minimums for the bank until things are sorted properly.

'YES' WINS
Australia joined the 21st century today, voting overwhelmingly in favour of 'marriage equality' in a national voluntary referendum. All states and territories recorded a majority Yes response. Of the 150 Federal Electoral Divisions, 133 recorded a majority Yes response, and 17 Federal Electoral Divisions recorded a majority No response. 12.7 mln people participated in the voluntary survey – representing almost 80% of the more than 16 mln eligible voters. New Zealand might be a loser in all this; we have gained considerable tourism benefits because of their archaic laws. However, the issue is not completely sorted yet; it needs Parliamentary action and parliamentarians are much more conservative than their constituents. Notably however, Tony Abbott, a No campaigner, has said "the people have spoken".

CUTTING OUT EARLY
The US President has skipped out of the East Asia Summit early today, surprising the leaders gathered in Manila. The move reinforces scepticism about the US commitments in Asia.

WHOLESALE RATES DOWN
Swpa rates fell -2 bps across the curve today. The 90 day bank bill rate is unchanged at 1.94%.

NZ DOLLAR HOLDS, BITCOIN HOLDS
The NZ dollar is stable at its lower level today, now 68.9 USc. On the cross rates we are softer as well at 90.8 AUc and at 58.4 euro cents. The TWI-5 is now at 72.2. The bitcoin price is at US$6,782, a +2.3% gain.

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