Here are the key things you need to know before you leave work today (or if you work from home, before you shutdown your laptop).

MORTGAGE RATE CHANGES
Bank of China announced its floating rate cut today. All rates are here. And note, you can compare mortgage offers with our new calculator that takes into account other costs and cashback incentives, here.

TERM DEPOSIT/SAVINGS RATE CHANGES
Kiwibank have cut their savings & Notice Saver account rates by -25 bps. Heartland and Bank of China did too. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.

MORE CONFIDENT, BUT NOT YET POSITIVE
The ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence lifted 6 points from 92.4 to 98.4 in November, the highest level since June. The proportion of households thinking it’s a good time to buy a major household item (the best retail indicator) rose 5 points but is still net negative at -9. This indicator hasn’t been positive in more than four years. Inflation expectations lifted slightly from 5.1% to 5.2%.

RISING PUBLIC SECTOR HIRING KEEPS OVERALL JOBS NUMBERS FROM FALLING
The October ‘filled jobs’ data released today isn’t very encouraging. The numbers were unchanged in October from September. Filled job numbers have been unchanged in four of the last five months now after revisions to previous results. This series tends to be revised lower in future releases so there is a chance that October’s flat result is revised to a fall. Maybe somewhat surprisingly, the largest annual increases in filled jobs were largely across public sector roles. Public administration (+2.2%) saw its largest increase since mid-2024. Healthcare (+1.7%) and education (1.3%) filled jobs remain higher than a year ago as well.

‘FORESEEABLY DEFICIENT’
Westpac NZ has been penalised $3.64 mln by the High Court for breaching lender responsibility principles, after multiple failures meant customers did not receive legally required information about their loans and, in some cases, agreed interest rate discounts. In her judgment, Justice Anderson found Westpac’s failures related to systems that were “set up in a way that was foreseeably deficient”.

HOUSING AFFORDABILITY RETURNS
Home ownership dream moving back within reach almost everywhere. Affordable levels for first home buyers – even in Auckland – are back in a much better place. A combination of long-run high house building levels, and reduced immigration, has brought the underlying factors under control. Lower interest rates are helping too.

CUSTOMER SATISFACTION AWARDS
RoyMorgan announced its annual customer satisfaction awards. In 2025, in the banking & insurance category, these were the ‘winners’. Bank of the Year – Rabobank. Major Bank of the Year – Kiwibank. Insurer of the Year – Farmers Mutual Group (FMG). Major Insurer of the Year – AA Insurance.

NZX50 FIRMS
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index was up +0.4% so far on Friday. That puts it up +0.5% over the past five working days. It is up +3.2% year-to-date. From a year ago it is now up +3.3%. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is little-changed today. Serko, Scales, EBOS, and Gentrack headline the gains; NZX, Vector, Ryman, and Investore are the big decliners.

LENDING FOR HOUSING RISES FASTER (THAN THE ECONOMY)
Lending for housing was up +5.5% in October from a year ago, the fastest rise since September 2022. Lending by banks for housing was up +5.8%, also a three year high. Lending for business purposes rose +5.1% and a 33 month high. Lending for agriculture was essentially unchanged in October from a year ago, the first time in eight months it hasn’t fallen. But there is little appetite in any of the dairy, sheep & beef, or horticulture sectors to borrow more. Those when do are being cancelled by those who are paying down their debt. Fonterra will make its big capital distribution of about $2/share tax-free in mid 2026, so that impact has yet to be felt.

HOUSEHOLDS TIRE OF HOLDING TDs
Household deposits rose +$619 mln in October from September to $266.5 bln. Transaction account balances account for +$428 mln of that rise, savings account balances +$615 mln. But term deposit balances fell -$425 mln in the month. That follows a -$657 mln fall in September. The last time household term deposit balances fell in both September and October was in 2020.

SWAP RATES RISE YET AGAIN
Wholesale swap rates are probably higher yet again today. Keep an eye on our chart below which will record the final positions closer to 5pm. The 90 day bank bill rate was up +3 bps at 2.44% on Thursday. Today, the Australian 10 year bond yield is up +5 bps at 4.53%. The China 10 year bond rate is down -1 bp at 1.83%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is up +5 bps from this time yesterday at 4.41%. The RBNZ data is now ‘prior day’ with Thursday’s rate up +1 bp at 4.34%. The UST 10yr yield is up +2 bps at 4.01%.

EQUITIES MIXED
The local equity market is up +0.6% in Friday trade so far. The ASX200 is up +0.1% in afternoon trade. Tokyo is down -0.2% in its opening trade. Hong Kong is down -0.5% and Shanghai is down -0.4%. Singapore is +0.4% firmer at its open. Wall Street didn’t trade due to the Thanksgiving Day holiday. And it will only trade for half a day tomorrow.

OIL FIRMS SLIGHTLY AGAIN
The oil price in the US up +50 USc just under US$59/bbl and the international Brent price is still at just under US$63/bbl.

CARBON PRICE LOW
We can’t find any trades today so the price holds at the low $40/NZU, the lowest since July 2023. (It peaked at $90.5/NZU in September 2022.) The next official carbon auction is on December 3, 2025 and likely heading for another failure. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.

GOLD STILL ON HOLD
In early Asian trade, gold is up +US$3/oz from yesterday at this time, now at US$4156/oz.

NZD STABLE
The Kiwi dollar is essentially unchanged from this time yesterday, still just on 57.2 USc. Against the Aussie we are holding at 87.6 AUc. Against the euro we are also up +10 bps at 49.4 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is little-changed from yesterday at just on 61.9.

BITCOIN ON HOLD
The bitcoin price is now at US$90,893 and down -0.3% from this time yesterday. Volatility has been low at just on +/- 0.7%.

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This soil moisture chart is animated here.

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