Tony Alexander: Independent Economics Commentator on ANZ revising its OCR forecast, potential for interest rates to reach 4%
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What does ANZ’s new forecast predict for New Zealand’s cash rate over the next six months?
Time to adjust your outlook on interest rates as the ANZ re enters the conversation and changes its view on New Zealand Inc. So they now see three cash rate hikes over the next six months. We're going to go from the current two point seven five cash rate to three point five. Tony Alexander, independent economics commentator, is back with us on the programme. Tony, morning to you. Yeah, good morning, Mike. Before we talk about anything, the Labour Party and the tax deductibility, do you understand the logic of it and do you like it?
Well, I I guess I like it in that we were seeing evidence of a lot of investors deciding to quit the sector uh entirely because of concern that the deductibility would disappear again. So it's r it's it's removing one of the elements I think which is just starting to cause some concern out there about the availability to your rental property long term.
Okay, good. Cash rate, the ANZ got it about right with three, do you think?
Yes, but it's going to go higher than three point five percent.
Why does Tony Alexander think the cash rate could rise to 4‑4.5 % instead of the ANZ estimate?
I mean, the Reserve Bank are predicting that the rate of growth in the economy will accelerate, the unemployment rate will uh fall, and as a result of that the rate of uh inflation will fall from four point one percent down to eventually two percent. It's it it doesn't really add up. And a key thing people need to note is that when we start a monetary policy cycle, uh tightening cycle, the phase of it, we always, including, you know, people like myself, we always underestimate how high the interest rates will go. So there is upside risk.
Okay. What do you think? What's your best guess this morning? If it's not three five, what is it eventually?
Four to four point five. I I don't think we'll we we end up at the five point five percent share, you know, uh following the the boom.
Yeah. Well well at four point five what's a what's the mortgage rate then?
How will a 4‑4.5 % cash rate affect mortgage rates and what does Tony recommend for borrowers?
Uh well yeah, you add on to that. Sorry, don't have that number in the top of my head, but uh if we're looking at two seventy five now, you add about uh what's that about one zero um one point seven five or so on top of that, uh the floating mortgage rates. The fixed rates won't go up by as much, but there's still upside risk there, and that's why I'm still a fan of fixing three years to to get across what I think is going to be a problematic period second half of twenty seven through twenty twenty eight. Not Now uh the will the Reserve Bank panic at all, but this is something for further out.
So so even so if you're talking twenty seven, twenty eight, are you assuming the war is over and oil is back down or were you that's in the don't know basket?
Don't know. Take it as it comes, essentially. Uh if if the war's over and uh oil prices fall away, uh then clearly that is going to be a positive thing. But there's a lot of other stuff going on as well, boosting uh inflation, you know, the fact that productivity in New Zealand is uh falling. Uh you've got uh the AI costs running through in terms of computer chip prices going up. Most of the electronic goods we consume have uh computer chips in them and that's
What are the main drivers behind business‑sector price pressures and margin squeezes?
been a key source of downward pressure on New Zealand's inflation for the last couple of decades. So that and a lot of other things.
So the immediate concerns of of of an interest rate increase, what's driving it more? Is it the imported inflation, i. e. oil, or the actual growth that we've dug out running annually at about two point six percent? Or you can't separate them out.
Yeah, I mean they both go into into the mix. It's not so much, I think, what's happening in the economy at the moment is the fact, certainly from my point of view, that the margins in the business sector have been crunched over the past three or so years. And when we look at uh you know like the ANZ's business outlook survey and net fifty one percent of businesses saying they're gonna raise their prices in the next uh twelve months, that's twice the average consistent with inflation, just above two percent. Businesses are is saying once the customers return, they've got to rebuild their margins.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What does ANZ’s new forecast predict for New Zealand’s cash rate over the next six months?
0:00–0:49
2
Why does Tony Alexander think the cash rate could rise to 4‑4.5 % instead of the ANZ estimate?
0:49–1:34
3
How will a 4‑4.5 % cash rate affect mortgage rates and what does Tony recommend for borrowers?
1:34–2:36
4
What are the main drivers behind business‑sector price pressures and margin squeezes?
2:36–3:25
5
Why does Tony say the Reserve Bank’s 2023 rate cuts were a mistake and what growth outlook does he see for next year?
3:25–4:38
6
Is the New Zealand economy too fragile for further tightening, or can it sustain higher growth?
4:38–5:36
Speakers
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