A review of things you need to know before you sign off on Wednesday; all eyes on rate cuts after the OCR reduction, Kiwibank fined for serious breaches, swaps rise, NZD rises, & more

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

MORTGAGE/LOAN RATE CHANGES
ANZ has moved early cutting fixed rates. Westpac followed with fixed rate cust. Following the OCR cut, almost all banks have followed with floating rate cuts. The Cooperative Bank actually cut their floating rate by -70 bps to a market-leading 6.95%. Others only by -50 bps. See the changes here. All rates are here.

TERM DEPOSIT/SAVINGS RATE CHANGES
ANZ also trimmed its term deposit rates early. Westpac has too. All updated rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here. Matching the OCR cut there have been a range of savings account rate cuts announced too, including by Kiwibank, and ASB who both did the full -50 reductions. Again, the Cooperative Bank cut some savings account rates by less.

-50 BPS CUT CONFIRMED
The Reserve Bank drops Official Cash Rate to 4.25% from 4.75%. It is continuing with monetary policy easing and has now cut the OCR by -125 basis points since August.

STILL POOR, BUT NOT AS POOR
Today Stats NZ released a paper previewing revisions to measures of GDP that will be released with the Q3-2024 GDP release on Thursday, December 19. These revisions reflect the incorporation of new benchmarks and various improvements to quarterly methodologies. Westpac says they expect the changes will show a better growth performance for the economy during a period of very strong population growth. But they also note that the labour market is getting no revision, and that this sector is operating "with some spare capacity".

KIWIBANK FINED FOR BREACHES
The state-owned bank has been fined $1.5 mln for "systemic breaches" of the Fair Trading Act. The Commerce Commission said "the offending was serious and the result of a raft of failures in Kiwibank’s systems".

NZX EQUITY MARKET UPDATE
Check out our quick update of how the NZX is faring today, as at 3pm. Gentrack lead from the front for a consecutive day up +5%, with Investore Property, Kathmandu Brands, Infratil, and The Warehouse all declining.

PROFIT SQUEEZE
China industrial profits were expected to fall -3.0% in the nine months to September and in the end they came in down -4.3% on that same basis. Not a huge slip, you may think. But ytd comparisons hide a lot and for September alone, they were -23% lower than in the same month a year ago. There is a definite profit squeeze going on in China.

BETTER THAN EXPECTED I
Markets thought the October CPI indicator in Australia would report a rise from the September level of 2.1%. But in the end there was no change. (Food, however, was up +3.3%, and also unchanged from September.) This overall result eased financial market fears that the RBA would have to weight harder against inflation. However, the 'hold' puts rate cuts there back in the frame earlier than otherwise assumed.

BETTER THAN EXPECTED II
Australian construction work completed in Q3-2024 also came with a positive surprise, up +3.2% from, the same quarter a year ago. Dragging on this result was virtually no change in residential construction. But unlike in the June quarter, every sector made some positive contribution to the overall gain. The actual result was way better than the limp +0.3% expectation.

SWAP RATES RISE
Wholesale swap rates are probably higher today because the RBNZ lowered its OCR forecast track less than expected. Our chart below will record the final positions. Yesterday the 90 day bank bill rate was little-changed. The Australian 10 year bond yield is up +2 bps from this time yesterday to 4.49%. The China 10 year bond rate is unchanged at 2.06%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is up +6 bps at 4.65% while today's RBNZ fix was 4.51% and up +1 bp. The UST 10yr yield is now at 4.28% and down another -7 bps. Their 2yr is down at 4.27%, so that positive curve has returned but only to +1 bp.

EQUITIES MIXED
The NZX50 has risen and is up +0.3% after the OCR decision. The ASX200 is up +0.5% in afternoon trade. Tokyo is down -0.8% at their open. Hong Kong is little-changed at its open and Shanghai is down -0.5%. Singapore is starting up +0.2%. Wall Street ended its Tuesday session up +0.6% on the S&P500.

OIL DIPS
The oil price is down -50 USc from this time yesterday, now at US$68.50/bbl in the US, and at just over US$72.50/bbl for the international Brent price.

CARBON PRICE HOLDS
The carbon price is little-changed today at US$63.60/NZU today. See our new daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.

GOLD SLIGHTLY FIRMER
In early Asian trade, gold is up +US$6 from this time yesterday, now at US$2631/oz.

NZD RISES
The Kiwi dollar is up +50 bps from this time yesterday, now at 58.7 USc. This is also related to the market interpretation of the OCR track. Against the Aussie we are up +70 bps at 90.7 AUc. And against the euro we are up +30 bps at 56 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is now at 68.2 and up +50 bps.

BITCOIN RETREATS FURTHER
The bitcoin price has fallen again -2.2% from this time yesterday, now at US$92,724. Volatility of the past 24 hours has been moderate at just on +/- 2.3%.

This soil moisture chart is animated here.

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