She declined the opportunity to explicitly talk the market up or down.
Rather, she stressed a couple of times: “There is no preset course for monetary policy.”
Breman said she would look at all the economic data due out before the Monetary Policy Committee next reviews the OCR on February 18.
She said that if circumstances changed, the Reserve Bank would adjust its stance accordingly.
This said, she noted she was yet to meet all the other Monetary Policy Committee members, who collectively set the monetary policy.
Breman said the outlook for inflation was “favourable”, as it look liked the rate was moving to the midpoint of the bank’s target range.
She said there were risks to both the upside and the downside.
There was no major initial market reaction to Breman’s comments being published.
Her predecessor Christian Hawkesby declined to talk down the market when the Herald interviewed him on November 27.
Asked what he made of swap rates rising, Hawkesby said: “I think we had an awareness of what the market reaction might be to our decision … We always have our markets team brief us on the likely reactions to different decisions we make. So it sort of fell in the ballpark of what we expected.”
Breman recognised it had been a challenging year for the Reserve Bank.
She underlined her commitment to transparency, saying she would speak to other Monetary Policy Committee members about possibly disclosing their individual views in more detail.
She also said she wanted the Reserve Bank to respond to Official Information Act requests in a timely manner, and release more information proactively.
Breman said she was keen to talk to New Zealanders, and was yet to properly travel beyond Wellington and Auckland.
Jenée Tibshraeny is the Herald’s Wellington business editor, based in the parliamentary press gallery. She specialises in government and Reserve Bank policymaking, economics and banking.
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