A review of things you need to know before you go home on Monday; no rate changes, smoke clouds inflation, retail sales rise +4.3%, ANZ to dump $835 mln in cash, wholesale rates hold, NZD unchanged

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

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
No changes reported today.

TERM DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
None here either.

SMOKE BUT NO FIRE
ANZ's monthly inflation monitoring for January brought the highest monthly rise in three years. But it was jerked up by new indirect taxes on tobacco and cigarettes which accounted for three quarters of the rise. Removing these leaves a still benign inflationary impulse of only +1.3% year-on-year.

PARTYING ON
New Zealand retail sales, as measured by electronic card use, was up +4.3% in January from the same month a year ago which is a quicker pace from what was recorded for December (+3.3% pa). Still, +4.3% is nothing special - it is about the average we have seen consistently since May 2016. The growth is coming from hospitality and petrol, although sales of durables are also stronger.

BIG REPAYMENT
ANZ NZ today said it intends to repay NZ$835 mln of perpetual subordinated bonds to investors on the next call date, 18 April 2018. That will put a very large amount of new liquidity into markets looking for a home. There are not many options this size than come up in the New Zealand market.

BENCHMARK INTEREST RATES FIRM
The UST 10 yr is now at 2.86% which is up +1 bp from this time on Friday. The Aussie 10 yr is at 2.88% (up +3 bps). The Chinese 10 yr is at 3.92% (up +1 bp), and the Kiwi 10 yr bond is 2.99% (unchanged). The 90 day bank bill rate is unchanged at 1.91%. Meanwhile, local swap rates have moved up a little today, basically up +1 bp for durations up to four years and +2 bps for the longer durations.

BITCOIN UNCHANGED
Bitcoin is now at US$8,300 which is little changed from today's opening.

NZ DOLLAR UNCHANGED
The Kiwi dollar has changed little today from its open although the greenback has weakened a little. It is currently at 72.6 USc, at 92.7 AUc and 59.1 euro cents. This puts the TWI-5 still at 73.9.