Here is our wrap of weekend events that affect New Zealand.
Chinese lawmakers have agreed to amend the country’s constitution to abolish presidential term limits. This will enable President Xi Jinping to rule for life. All but a handful of the National People’s Congress’s nearly 3,000 delegates endorsed getting rid of the two term limit put in place in 1982.
Other amendments to the constitution include a clause affirming the Communist Party’s leading role in governing China, and provisions for a new anticorruption agency that more heavy handily polices public servants.
Back home, the new National Party Leader, Simon Bridges, has given Judith Collins a boost in his caucus reshuffle. Number four on the list; Collins has been given Housing and Urban Development, as well as Planning portfolios. She is behind Deputy Leader Paula Bennet and Finance Spokesperson Amy Adams.
Gerry Brownlee has been demoted to 11th and has lost his Foreign Affairs and Trade portfolio to Todd McClay, who’s at five. Jami-Lee Ross has shot up the ranks, given Infrastructure and Transport, as has Paul Goldsmith with Economic Regional Development and Revenue. Without Brownlee, Bill English and Steven Joyce front and centre, the National Party looks very different to what it did in the John Key era.
The US economy added the largest number of jobs in more than a year-and- a-half in February, but a slowdown in wage growth points to only a gradual increase in inflation this year. Nonfarm payrolls jumped by 313,000 jobs last month, boosted by a rise in construction jobs. The US labour market is benefiting from strong domestic demand, improved global growth, and President Donald Tump’s tax cuts.
New Zealand businessman Chris Liddell is tipped to become Trump's top economic adviser after Gary Cohn's exit from the White House. According to the New York Times, Trump is "strongly considering" Liddell, who works as an assistant to Trump. Cohn announced his resignation last week after an unsuccessful effort to block Trump from imposing tariffs on steel and aluminium imports. Liddell is a former Carter Holt Harvey CEO, Microsoft CFO and General Motors CFO.
Over to China again, its consumer price index rose an unexpectedly high 2.9% (yoy) in February, largely off the back of higher food prices. China’s producer price index cooled to a 15-month low, increasing by 3.9%.
Chinese banking regulators are imposing tougher lending restrictions. They limited new loan issuance to just NZ$182 billion in February – a huge drop from the NZ$630 billion limit in January.
In New York, the UST 10 yr yield has jumped since the end of last week to 2.90%.
The US benchmark oil price has risen to US$62/bbl. The Brent benchmark is just above US$65/bbl.
Gold price is stable at US$1,322/oz.
The NZD has strengthened slightly to 72.9 USc. It's down to 92.9 AUc and up to 59.2 euro cents. That leaves the TWI-5 stronger at 74.0.
ANZ economists say that Trump looking to do side deals on newly imposed tariffs could support the AUD, lifting the kiwi at the same time. However, the local focus will be Q4 GDP growth later in the week, which should support the NZD too.
The price of bitcoin has remained pretty stable over the weekend. It's at US$9,600.
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