Its been an eventful week so far in NZ with the government there asking the Reserve Bank of New Zealand to consider policies to contain house prices rises.
ICYMI from Tuesday:
- RBNZ's Gov Orr says the Bank already gives consideration to asset prices
- RBNZ says it will engage constructively on the government proposal it adds a house price remit
- NZD is rocketing on the RBNZ house price news
- NZ government is considering adding house prices to the RBNZ mandate
On Wednesday RBNZ Governor Orr duly outlined his policies, FT had a nice summary:
I should note the NZD also got a boost Wednesday from Reserve Bank of New Zealand Governor Orr saying:
- while the Bank wanted to be 'operationally' prepared for negative rates the Bank has not yet said it'll be going negative
- did not mention comments he has made previously that he wants to work to get bond yields lower
Westpac comments (bolding mine):
- "That might make the RBNZ less gung-ho about lowering interest rates in the near term,"
- "We were forecasting OCR cuts in April, May and August, but that timing now looks less likely. We are reviewing our OCR forecasts and will update them in due course."
