March housing finance
The total number of loans to owner-occupiers fell by 6.1% in March, following a 6.8% drop in February. Prior to that housing finance was relatively resilient.
One word of caution - it is possible that weakness in March was exaggerated because of Easter. The ABS advise that they (attempt to) adjust for this effect.
The [...]
Tags: Australia and New Zealand
Australia seems the better bet between Oz and New Zealand as in Australia you have a more hawkish central bank and early signs of a rekindling of the M&A boom after yesterday’s announcement of a A$13B AUD-positive M&A. The move lower in gold is not bullish Aussie, but on the other hand copper and the [...]
Tags: AUDUSD
NZ cash rates are a long way above real neutral
Reflecting increasing downside risk to activity stemming from a much weaker housing market, tighter credit conditions, and a deteriorating global growth backdrop, market brought forward the first rate cut to Q4 2008 from Q1 2009. An extra 50bp of easing next year is also expected, taking [...]