A review of things you need to know before you go home on Friday; ASB cuts rates for mortgages and term deposits, FMA sees trust crisis, wholesale trade jumps, household net worth growth dips, swaps and NZD slip

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

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
ASB (and Sovereign) cut their three and five year fixed rates today by -40 bps. They also announced a KiwiBuild low-deposit offer, and some cash-back.

TERM DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
ASB also cut some term deposit rates as well.

'A CRISIS IN TRUST'
FMA boss called for financial services firms to stop focusing on shareholders at the expense of customers, with public trust the worst it has been since the GFC, he says.

A STRONG COMPONENT
One of the final elements that goes into our GDP result was announced today. Wholesale trade for the June quarter came in +7.1%, up from +6.0% in the March quarter. That is the best rise for a June quarter since 2011. Driving this result were very good horticultural exports. The actual value of total wholesale trade sales was $26.7 bln in the June 2018 quarter, up +$1.7 bln from the same quarter a year ago.

RENT VARIATIONS
National median rents were unchanged in August. But they fell in Auckland. Median weekly rent for a 3 bedroom house in Auckland fell to $622, and down from $650/week in June. Median weekly rent for a 2 bedroom flat is now $460, down from $475/week in June. Wellington and Christchurch rents are not moving much.

FASTER GAINS
Household disposable annual income was up +5.5% in the year to June according to data released by the RBNZ today. The June quarter household disposable income was up a slightly faster +5.6% compared to the same quarter a year ago. Both rises are faster gains than in the 2016 to 2017 comparative periods.

LOSING STEAM
Household financial assets reached an impressive $877 bln as at June 2018, a rise of +3.1% gain year-on-year. That is down from a gain of +3.4% in the previous year. These financial assets do not include housing. Total financial liabilities (which do include housing loans) reached $215 bln, a +6.4% rise. That means that net financial wealth of households rose just +2.0% to $662 bln. It rose +2.2% in the previous year. There was no update today for the June net equity in housing; that won't come until later in the year.

SOMETHING TO WATCH
Tomorrow most eyes will be on the US non-farm payrolls report. But keep an eye on Asian stock markets. They were down sharply yesterday, and today Tokyo is down another -1%, Hong Kong is down -0.8%, and Shanghai is down -0.1%. Locally, the NZX is down -0.2% and the ASX is down -0.8%. These continuing losses are starting to mount up.

SWAP RATES LOWER
Swap rates are lower by another -1 bp across the board again today. The UST 10yr is down -3 bps at 2.88%. The UST 2-10 curve is now just over +25 bps. The Aussie Govt 10yr is at 2.55% (down -3 bps), the China Govt 10yr is at 3.65% (up +1 bp), while the NZ Govt 10 yr is at 2.56%, down -1 bp. The 90 day bank bill rate is unchanged at 1.90%.

BITCOIN STABLE
The bitcoin price is at US$6,503 up +1% from this time yesterday.

NZD LOWER
The NZD has slipped to 65.8 USc. On the cross rates we are firmer as well at 91.7 AUc, and holding at 56.6 euro cents. That puts the TWI-5 slightly lower at 69.5.

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