Here's our summary of key economic events overnight that affect New Zealand, with news China has taken more action to juice up its liquidity situation.
But first, the Americans have finished their Thanksgiving Day holiday, and are turning their attention to shopping. It looks like the huge Black Friday retail event won't have quite the impact it once did, but it will still be important and markets will react to retailer sales reports. Early indications are not auspicious.
As we forecast a few days ago, China has pulled the trigger on lowering its bank reserve ratio requirements (RRR) by -25 bps, effective from December 5th, releasing around CNY ¥½ tln in long-term liquidity (NZ$110 bln) in an attempt to boost economic activity. It follows a similar move in April. The RRR for big banks now stands at 11%, the lowest since mid-2007 while the weighted average ratio for financial institutions stands at 7.8%. Authorities also said they aim to "keep liquidity reasonably ample".
Singapore saw its industrial production rise in October from September, and by more than expected, but that wasn't enough to avoid a year-on-year dip.
Still somewhat confounding expectations, Germany reported an improved economic expansion on their September quarter than earlier estimated. Consumer sentiment has stopped falling too, but it remains very weak. French consumer confidence improved too, but it is also very weak.
And Spain is pushing ahead with new wealth taxes and new taxes on banks and energy companies, although it is now clear that the amount they expect to raise is much less than earlier indicated, especially on energy companies.
In Australia, voters in Victoria are going to the polls today to elect a State Government. It is expected to be a close race. The Murdoch press has been going hard against Premier Daniel Andrews with some pretty wild accusations.
The UST 10yr yield starts today at 3.69% and unchanged from yesterday but down -11 bps from one week ago. The UST 2-10 rate curve is little-changed at -78 bps. And their 1-5 curve has stayed inverted at -87 bps. but their 30 day-10yr curve is much more inverted at -34 bps. The Australian ten year bond is up +8 bps at 3.60%. The China Govt ten year bond is up +4 bps at 2.85%. But the New Zealand Govt ten year will start today little-changed at 4.16%. A week ago it was at 4.22%.
Wall Street did a half-day session today and the S&P500 was little-changed to end the week up +1.5%. Overnight, European markets all ended little-changed too on very light volumes. Yesterday Tokyo ended its Friday session down -0.4% for a weekly gain of +1.0%. Hong Kong ended down -0.5% and a similar weekly loss. Shanghai ended up +0.4% for a weekly gain of +0.8%. The ASX200 was up +0.2% on Friday to cap their week with a +1.5% gain. The NZX50 posted a flat weekly result after a Friday gain of +0.5%.
The NZX50's unchanged weekly result holds on to a +2.2% gain over the past month. For the week, F&P Healthcare (FPH, #1) rose +0.8% and Tourism Holdings (THL, #38) rose +4.3%. But a few good rises were more than offset by some sharpish falls by many minnows. Among the worst were the -7.8% fall by troubled Eroad (ERD, #50) and the -10.1% weekly fall by Ryman (RYM, #13). In fact the whole retirement/rest home sector is taking a real battering, down -7.9% for the week overall, down -12.5% for the month, and giving up a huge -37% over the past year. That is a loss of capitalisation for this sector of -$3.7 bln in a year. They have gone from a hero sector to zero rather quickly. Heavy spending on TV advertising can't hide the vulnerabilities to the real estate market, staffing issues, and an overbuilt situation.
The price of gold will open today down -US$4 at US$1753/oz. This almost exactly the same as a week ago.
And oil prices start today down -US$1 from this time yesterday at just under US$77/bbl in the US while the international Brent price is just on US$84/bbl. These levels are -US$2 lower than a week ago.
The Kiwi dollar will open today at 62.4 USc, up almost +1c since this time last week. Against the Australian dollar we are little-changed at 92.5 AUc. Against the euro we are still firm at 60 euro cents. That all means our TWI-5 starts today at 71.2 and up +60 bps from this time last week.
The bitcoin price is now at US$16,496 and down -0.6% from this time yesterday and down a mere -0.4% from this time last week. Volatility over the past 24 hours has low at +/- 0.8%.
The easiest place to stay up with event risk today is by following our Economic Calendar here ».
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Here in Malaka Malaysia, a tourist mecca hotspot for asians and europeans, there are a massive amount of unfinished hotel and retail buildings. The big malls are devoid of trade and many shops have gone. For sale signs are everywhere . If people cant afford to come here ( because its cheap) theres seems little chance of NZ filling up with a bounty of immigrants and tourists looking for work and accomodation. It appears that the chinese pulled funding during covid and havent returned. Kuala Lumpur is quiet too.
Our malls are teaming with people, hard to get a carpark often, so I guess migrants may come here. NZ is quite a bit different to Malaysia.
Edit: It's also not easy emigrating to Malaysia. You need a sponsor. You'll likely never get citizenship. So for immigration people may pull out all stops to get to NZ. It's not a holiday.
It is a beautiful country and the people are wonderful to be amongst. But the nation is being run headwind, uphill by Bumiputra, a racially selective system as counterproductive as any fool could design. Perhaps that explains why NZ’s current government is hellbent on the same track?
No. In 70/80s it was part of my market area, the Far East as my then boss described it.. There two or three times a year. Usual centres, cities. Business colleagues there, mainly Chinese ethnicity, became great friends, got to visit their homes & family, learned much from that. I changed employer and moved on, but have managed to return for a couple of holidays.
Ironically, actually oddly, our ex neighbours in the USA who are elderly, have always stayed clear of malls, started to frequent them during the heatwave there during summer. They have a cup of coffee, enjoy the air conditioning, and window shop. “Yes” they admitted over the phone “we have become mall walkers.”
I met an elderly person in Sylvia Park recently who told me they go there to walk laps of the mall a few times a week. Like you mention the mall is air conditioned and they're protected from the elements, they get exercise and they also like the social aspect of being surrounded by people and said it lifted their spirits. Good on them I said and I'd likely follow their lead in my later years as I think it's such a positive thing to do, especially to keep loneliness at bay.
Can't stand malks, but since having kids I can see the appeal compared to main-streets. Once you've parked the car you're ina fully pedestrianised area. No cars to mow your kids down, so you can relax and let them run free. Was in one of incidentally today (without kids) to pick up a purchase, was not busy at all.
HM. I had the really bad idea of saying yes to my wife, to accompany her to Sylvia Park shopping mall today… OMG, what a crowd! for starters we could not find a car park anywhere, then the shops inside the mall are crazy busy, so are both food courts, it's unbelievable. People are definitely not heeding Orr's advice to pull back on spending.
Did you actually read what I wrote Yvil?
I am suggesting that the busy-ness is somewhat of an illusion. I go to Sylvia Spark a lot, as does my 14 year old daughter. I mentioned the example of a coffee and a small spend at H & M. I am sure there are many variations on this theme, lots of young people just go there to hang out, go to Maccas and walk around. I think you will find that many people who go there don’t necessarily spend much money, *on average* ( of course you see the occasional person walking around with several shopping bags).
Of course this is purely an anecdotal opinion, I don’t have data to back it up.
Also it’s heightened busy-ness past couple of days will be Black Friday-related.
Only a handful of food outlets remain in the CBD near my office - even the dominos franchise has left now. First and second floors of our building completely empty - by my count that was 9 businesses.
And I was at St Lukes Saturday two weeks ago to finish our Christmas shopping, and was surprised at how quiet it was compared to the last time I was there - which was 2008 just before the GFC. (Maybe Silvia park and Westgate explain some of that, but we had a population explosion meanwhile also).
I haven't had any trouble getting a car park anywhere at all this year - even Silvia Park.
It has been barely a few months since our borders were reopened and MIQ dropped. Given the pent-up demand for families reuniting after over 2 years of separation, I think it is too soon to celebrate high "tourist arrival" numbers in NZ.
I see why the government would "reject" such a point, desperately trying to convince voters that the NZ economy is still strong and there hasn't been much damage from their overextended lockdown.
It is going to take many years for tourism numbers to return, if ever, to pre-pandemic levels for NZ and many other places. Like for housing, there was a massive tourism bubble growing unsustainably for years in the lead up to COVID, all around the world. Flights are now a lot more expensive and will remain so for awhile perhaps a long time, the middle class around the world is getting squeezed with cost-of-living rises and the outlook isn't great. Chinese tourists are basically out of the game, who knows for how long.
While tough for those relying on the tourism industry for a living, not a bad thing overall as tourism was pretty much out of control in many places, especially in Asia.
And oil prices start today down -US$1 from this time yesterday at just under US$77/bbl in the US while the international Brent price is just on US$84/bbl. These levels are -US$2 lower than a week ago.
Venezuela is exempt from OPEC production quota. Easing of US sanctions is a big climbdown but with Iran not playing ball and Libya out of business, beggars can’t be choosers! A morality play for India which complied with US sanctions against Venezuela! Link
Maybe the pirates at the BoE will return their gold?
I shared a report here months ago that showed how much oil-producing assets in the US shale belt changed hands during Covid from smaller independents to larger players, many picked up by the supermajors.
Unsurprisingly, such market consolidation has led to a shift in strategy towards maintaining global prices higher for longer and away from "drill baby drill" .
Lessons from Japan. It appears that FTX Japan customers were not exposed to the fraud and local regulation has protected them. In a worse case scenario, Crypto owners in Japan have greater claim than NZ bank account holders.
The company [FTX] has suspended operations under an order this month from the Financial Services Agency, Japan's financial watchdog. While that is set to end Dec. 9, "we're prioritizing returning assets over reopening," Melamed said.
Crypto exchanges are regulated unusually tightly in Japan. Cryptocurrency assets deposited by customers, or amounts equivalent to them, must be held in "cold storage" -- wallets not connected to the internet. Customers are given preferential rights to recover their money if an exchange collapses.
https://asia.nikkei.com/Editor-s-Picks/Interview/FTX-Japan-executive-se…
I would have thought aged care demand is easily demographically predictable. Albeit requiring periodic price adjustments currently related to negative average house prices.
Quite remarkable that any discussion about the Japan property bubble that someone will always say "Oh but Japan's demographics are dreadful" as some kind of excuse as to a property bubble will burst there and not here.
Nobody ever predicted the bursting of the Japan bubble becase of demogs when the mkt was ascending.
Anectodally yes. They can’t sell my grandmas apartment in medowbank (Oceania). Been on the market 4 months. Likely their price expectations are way too high plus potentially owners can’t release their capital to buy the apartment as they can’t sell their own house. The retirement sector is a rort. My mother will receive the cost my grandma paid in 2017 ($800k) less 30%. They currently have the apartment marketed for $1.15million.
Thank you Albert. You could say 2017 at $800K and $1150K in 2022 matches everywhere else. But also maybe there is oversupply, with vast numbers of new builds in recent years.
$240K (the 30%) in five years is good for them. I am seeing huge advertising lately, they will not want to have a price war but maybe they will have to.
Ironic that Philip Lowe the RBA governor is quoted from 2002 about the instability caused by credit-driven asset bubbles in this review of how low interest rates have sowed the seeds for our current dilemna.
If you looked at real estate booms and credit booms, and put them together, you get what [they call] high-cost recessions
Edward Chancellor
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/nov/27/conflict-of-interest-h…
This needs more attention and discussion. Is it a symptom or a cause?
If we believe that asset price inflation and creating new asset classes equals wealth creation, is the number 1 societal/cultural value, and via this we can leverage more debt, are we not just repeating the same thing over and over? Insanity? And the reason it happens at a larger scale is because we're not learning the lesson from the previous instance?
It's a win for the banks, the giant corporations and financial institutions, but I'm thinking that on the whole it's not a win for the people.
I see that interest or return on lending is referred to in the article but there is no mention that in many other periods and cultures it was also illegal.
Our "Liquidity" is up for grabs......and it ain't into the "Public Purse"
Racist it maybe...but is it now "Black Friday" every Day.
3 Waters is totally the wrong way to look at our 'Futures" water in particular..and it is here now seen in "Black and White" ....Racism is not a road to follow Jacinda, Flogging a ''Stream of Protests" is not what she should be "About"
And now it is here...in "Blaclk and White" water comes from Heaven.....not racist content....Wakey Waken.....Voters.....You is gonna be sold a "Pup" .....from now on..............and no "Pregnant Pause" for the "Future" of all...man kind. One water for "ALL" ...not 3 for One.
Morrins-vile at the moment. Clean water is a must have, not a 3rd degree load of of crap....same at the Beach when you want a clean swim...some hopes?? when a sewer pipes up and spits in your Face.
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