A review of things you need to know before you sign off on Tuesday; the first 4% TD rate for a term less than 1 year, mortgage borrowing anemic, an epic breach, swaps leap again, NZD stay very low, & more

Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today (or if you already work from home, before you shutdown your laptop).

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
The Police Credit Union raised its one year fixed rate to 5.15%.

TERM DEPOSIT RATE CHANGES
Unity Money raised its 3, 4 and 9 month TD rates. TSB raised its 6 and 9 month rates to 3.45% and 4.00%. That is the first time in the rate cycle that any bank has offered 4% for a term less than one year.

TIME TWISTERS
For readers who work with international connections, you should know that while we have moved to Daylight Saving Time already, Australia hasn't yet. New Zealand is now three hours ahead of the Australian East Coast and will be all week. Victoria and NSW move to their version of Daylight Saving Time on Sunday, October 2, 2022. The US doesn't end its Daylight Savings Time until November 6, 2022. Europe ends earlier on October 30, 2022. Neither Japan nor China use the adjustment.

ANEMIA ON DISPLAY
The depth of the anemia in the mortgage market is on full display in the latest borrowing details for new mortgages in August. The 2022 levels are now lower than the pre-pandemic 2019 levels, so the surge in between has now well and truly expired. Total new lending in August was $5.4 bln, and that was down a third from August 2021. First home buyer borrowing was down -20% on the same basis, owner-occupiers borrowed -37% less, and investors borrowed -34% less. The data is in C31. More here.

BROADER REWARDS
BNZ says it is expanding its customer rewards system beyond activity on credit cards. Currently their customers participate via FlyBuys and their Cash Rewards. These schemes will be rolled into BNZ Rewards and allow a wider range of activity to build balances, and widening the options on how they can use them, including cashing them in.

BORDER REWARDS
The Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme is expanding fast. Today another 3000 places have been authorised taking the total to now 19,000 annually from participating Pacific countries. The easing is designed to help the horticulture and wine industries, but the effect will spread wider.

YIELDS ROCKET HIGHER
This morning we missed noting that the US Treasury 2-year bond tender brought an unusual result. It was a very well supported tender that resulted in a median yield of 4.22%. That was sharply higher than the equivalent event a month ago where the median yield was 3.25%. Normally these yields change by a new basis points. This change was huge. (See note below.)

SENTIMENT TEA-LEAVES
There were a series of consumer confidence surveys out today. These have increasing importance given the background economic data is wobbling. If consumer sentiment wobbles too, a downbeat future is all-but-certain. In Australia, consumer sentiment is rising in this ANZ-Roy Morgan survey and is now at a four month high. But in the longer-term perspective 'high' might be stretching it. In Taiwan, their consumer sentiment survey slipped slightly in September. In South Korea their consumer sentiment rose and is now well off its July drop.

SMALL SLIP?
In China, industrial profits were unchanged in August, embedding in a small fall for the first eight months of 2022. Given the sluggish Chinese economy, a fall is consistent with other data. But that they have limited the slippage to just -2.1% is impressive, if true.

AN EPIC BREACH
We haven't been reporting on it elsewhere, but the 'hack' or 'breach' of Australia's Optus mobile network is an epic failure, one that could have serious consequences for their almost 10 million customers. Optus have allowed customer details like credit card details, bank account details, passport numbers, drivers license numbers to be compromised to bad actors. It is so bad that banks will now have a very tough time verifying customer bona fides, because just about all the details they need for online verification are compromised - for 10 mln people! It is hard to see how agencies like banks and others can actually use online verification now to meet their AML/CFT obligations. Bank branches are going to be very crowded places - with very disgruntled customers waiting to do checks that seemed automatic before. Your online shopping accounts are probably the most at risk, but the infection will spread very widely. It won't just be banks that cant trust Optus customers. Optus is Australia's second largest telco. Here's a way to check if your phone or email account has been breached from any source.

SWAP RATES RACE ON UP FURTHER
Wholesale swap rates are probably much firmer today on global forces. At time of writing they were up in a steepening trend by another +10 bps. But the key action comes near the close. Our chart will record the final positions. The 90 day bank bill rate is up another +5 bps at 3.81% which is a new high since January 2015. The Australian 10 year bond yield is now at 4.06% and off -2 bps since yesterday. The China 10 year bond rate is up +1 bp from yesterday at 2.74%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is now at 4.32%, up another sharp +12 bps from the end of last week and now still well above the earlier RBNZ fix for this bond at 4.29% which was up +19 bps from Friday. The UST 10 year is now at 3.88% and up a remarkable +16 bps from this time Friday. You have to go back to 2008 to find such a high level for this key benchmark.

THE EQUITY SELL OFF DEEPENS
Wall Street ended its Monday trade down -1.1% on the S&P500. That has compounded to a -7.6% fall so far in September and a -23.8% fall from the peak at the end of 2021 and well into a strong bear phase. However Tokyo is up +0.7% in early trade today after yesterday's -2.7% dive. Hong Kong is down -0.5% at today's open. Shanghai is up +0.2%. The ASX200 is up +0.2% in early afternoon trade today after falling -1.3% yesterday. The NZX50 is down -0.6% to start our week which in the global scheme is only a modest retreat so far.

GOLD RECOVERS
In early Asian trade, gold is at US$1,632/oz and rising from its New York close earlier at US$1,622/oz.

NZD STAYS VERY LOW
The Kiwi dollar firmed from its unnervingly low rate this morning, up +40 bps since then to 56.9 USc. That is a -2.6% devaluation since this time Friday. From the start of September, that is now a -7.2% devaluation. Against the AUD we are down at 87.6 AUc. Against the euro we are now at 59 euro cents. That all means our TWI-5 is at 67.6 and down -80 bps from this time Friday.

BITCOIN FIRM
Bitcoin has risen today and is now at US$19,334 and up +1.4% from US$19,076 when we opened this morning. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been moderate at just under +/- 1.8%.

This soil moisture chart is animated here.

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