90 seconds at 9 am: Soros shorting A$ ?

90 seconds at 9 am: Dow hold its highs; US banks lend more to business; EU retail sales fall again; alarm at AU budget hole; NZ$1 = US$0.852 TWI = 78.7

7th May 13, 8:43am by David Chaston

Here's my summary of the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am, including the Dow is holding its big Friday gains in late New York trade today.

A US Fed loan survey released this morning for April shows that most American banks eased business loan conditions, an important thaw in credit availability for medium sized businesses.

Across the Atlantic, ECB President Draghi said he is ready to cut interest rates again if needed after reducing them to a record low last week. And retail sales in the eurozone fell for the second month in a row in March, according to the latest official stats.

China made some important announcements yesterday toward floating its currency and installing a market based interest rate system, and that included plans to allow Chinese individuals to invest overseas.

Cuba is taking Australia to court in the WTO challenging it's tough tobacco-labelling rules. As we have similar rules, presumably NZ will be subject to Cuban ire too.

Here at home, it is worth noting that readymix concrete production in Auckland in the first quarter of 2013 was up 22% from the same period a year ago, and up on Q4 2012. This is the first region to report and it suggests that with the surge in Christchurch quake recovery work, our GDP growth was pretty good in the March quarter. Together with yesterday's encouraging Crown accounts data for March, New Zealand seems to be in an improving position.

But there is growing alarm in Australia that their Federal budget is in big danger. The figure mentioned yesterday is that it could be facing an A$80 bln black hole as tax revenues fall and show no signs of recovery.

There are also rumours that George Soros is shorting the Aussie currency, betting on a rate cut when the RBA makes its announcement later this afternoon.

The NZ dollar has risen to 83.1 AUc this morning, it highest level since October 2009. It starts today at 85.2 USc, and our TWI now stands at 78.7.

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6 Comments

by powerdownkiwi | 7th May 13, 9:15am 1367874924

encouraging.

improving position.

pretty good.

Actually, you're reporting a ton of atmospheric carbon, per ton of concrete. I like the material myself, but acknowledge the impact, and don't call it's increased use encouraging, improving or pretty good. I plant several more trees, and try to use it in a manner which can be of use for hundreds of years.

I call it a continuance of a doomed, faith-requiring ideology, with provably-serious consequences.

by Uninterested | 7th May 13, 9:43am 1367876621

The greenies don't like concrete paving in residential areas.

It doesn't look or feel as good as grass, but it does mean that you don't, and your descendents don't ever have to use fossel fuels again to mow that bit of land.

PS. I tried using an electric flymo to mow my lawn but that short circuited. The kikuyu grass was way too tough, so using hydro power is not an option in my area, unless I was to spray roundup everywhere and start again.......

by powerdownkiwi | 7th May 13, 9:52am 1367877173

humour acknowledged, but you miss the point via failure to clear the mind before engaging computation.

Grass is not the issue. Gen Zero - they who will inherit the mess, who are intelligent enough to see what is coming, and can organise/fill a 500-person l-theatre in a jiffy - are into urban food planting, guerilla gardening, not 'mowing'.

The joke falls flat when the target doesn't have the same dinosaur mind-set.

by Boatman | 7th May 13, 10:25am 1367879122

Dammit ... the Aus$ is about to get weaker making the Kiwi$ even stronger against the Aussie , and our exports even more expensive . This is not going to end well for us. W need some bad news to weaken the Kiwi$

by Gareth Vaughan | 7th May 13, 4:42pm 1367901766

CIR Petition of Roy Reid

Tuesday, 7 May 2013, 3:00 pm

Press Release: New Zealand Parliament

CIR Petition of Roy Reid

Petition of Roy Reid under the Citizens Initiated Referenda Act 1993 asking if an indicative referendum should be held on the following question:

“Do you support the Government selling up to 49% of Meridian Energy, Mighty River Power, Genesis Power, Solid Energy and Air New Zealand?”

The Clerk of the House of Representatives Mary Harris has today certified that this petition has lapsed because she cannot be satisfied that the threshold required by the Citizens Initiated Referenda Act 1993 has been met. The Clerk has been assisted in reaching this conclusion by advice from the Government Statistician.

Before a citizens initiated referendum can be held, the Act requires the Clerk to be satisfied that the petition has been signed by 10% of eligible electors as at the date the petition was delivered to her. The petition was delivered on 12 March 2013.

Advice received from the Electoral Commission indicated that 308,753 valid signatures were required for the petition to meet the threshold required by the Act.

Upon receiving the petition the Office of the Clerk undertook a counting and sampling process. Once the signatures had been counted, a sample of signatures was taken using a methodology provided by the Government Statistician. The sample was then checked by the Electoral Commission to identify how many signatories were eligible electors as at 12 March. Some signatories could not be found on the electoral roll, either because they were not enrolled or because the identifying information they supplied was insufficient or illegible. Some duplicate signatures were also identified.

The results from checking the sample were then analysed by the Government Statistician, who is confident that the petition has not succeeded in meeting the threshold. It is short by approximately 16,500 valid signatures.

The Act provides that if the promoter wishes to resubmit the petition he has two months from today to collect additional signatures.

by Hevi Groswaite | 8th May 13, 8:10am 1367957446

How do we get this petition rolling again?

I try to keep up with events, but this petition went by me way "under the radar", I would be very keen to promote this petition in my area. Could you give me some pointers on how to proceed?

Thank you.

HGW