BNZ Weekly Overview - May 4 Edition

Welcome to the May 4 edition of the BNZ Weekly Overview.

This week we are once again running our monthly confidence survey so if you have a few seconds please click on the URL below and tick whether you think the economy will get better or worse over the next 12 months. More importantly let us know what you're seeing in your own industry at the moment and as usual we shall gather these various comments together and they will form the bulk of our confidence survey release early next week.

http://www.closer.co.nz/bnzeconomist.asp

With regard to major news items this week we have seen interest rates raised a quarter of a percent come across the Tasman with prospects for Australian growth improving recently. Most data releases in the United States have been on the positive side, and these two developments have helped push up wholesale fixed borrowing costs in New Zealand. The New Zealand dollar has risen slightly against the greenback during the week but we have fallen against the Australian currency to the lowest level since May 2002 near 83.2 cents.

SEE FULL BNZ WEEKLY OVERVIEW IN PDF FORMAT:
http://img.scoop.co.nz/media/pdfs/0605/WOMay4.pdf

Best regards
Tony Alexander
Chief Economist

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