American consumer inflation expectations<\/a> for the year ahead rose to 3.1% in July from 3% in June. This was held back only because of the widespread perception that petrol prices would fall. The median year-ahead expected change in food prices remained unchanged at 5.5%. Looking further ahead inflation expectations in five years rose to 2.9% from 2.6%.<\/p>\n Meanwhile Q2 American labour productivity<\/a> improved in data released today. It rose by 2.4% in the quarter following a revised -1.8% drop in the prior period. Analysts expected a +2% increase. Output increased by 3.7% (vs -0.6% in Q1) and hours worked increased by 1.3% (vs 1.2%).<\/p>\n The US agricultural sector used to be a powerhouse export driver. But no more. Data<\/a> released yesterday shows it has turned into a net importer, a trend that started in 2018 in the first Trump presidency. The first half of 2025 has now recorded its largest deficit on record, mainly on stuttering exports.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, American consumer credit<\/a> rose in June but only modestly. Total consumer credit rose by just +US$7.4 bln in the month, up from a +US$5.1 bln in May. These are minor changes and don’t indicate any impending credit stress.<\/p>\n Across the Atlantic in a tighter than expected vote, the Bank of England cut its policy rate by -25 bps to 4.0%<\/a>. They have inflation running at 3.6% with a target of 2%. Five of the nine voting members voted for the cut, four wanted no-change. This was much closer than the 7:2 vote expected.<\/p>\n In China, they are not only subsidising trade-in programs to help juice their domestic economy, now they are subsidising interest rates on personal loans<\/a>. Consumer credit has not been traditionally popular in China, but young people are signing up much more freely. It is a sector that may grow to hold financial stability risks.<\/p>\n Standard & Poors have affirmed<\/a> China’s sovereign credit rating at A+ Stable. China’s government gets a AAA rating from its own domestic ratings agencies, but Beijing was pleased<\/a> anyway with the S&P result.<\/p>\n Container freight rates<\/a> fell -3% last week from the week before to be -58% lower than year-ago levels, although to be fair those were an unusual peak. Outbound from China was again the main weakness although outbound from the US is now showing up as a weakening trade too – and that starts with very low rates anyway. Bulk cargo rates were essentially unchanged over the past week and are now +18% higher than a year ago.<\/p>\n Modern social media<\/a>.<\/p>\n The UST 10yr yield is now at 4.25%, up +3 bps from yesterday. The key 2-10 yield curve is still at +51 bps. Their 1-5 curve is still at -14 bps. And their 3 mth-10yr curve is holding at -11 bps. The Australian 10 year bond yield starts today at 4.25% and down -1 bp from yesterday. The China 10 year bond rate is softer at 1.70%. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate starts today at just over 4.44% and down -3 bps.<\/p>\n Wall Street is soft today, down -0.4% from yesterday on the S&P500. Overnight, European markets were mixed with London down -0.7% but Frankfurt and Paris up more than +1%. Tokyo ended its Thursday session up another +0.6%. Hong Kong was up +0.7%, Shanghai was up +0.2% and Singapore was also up +0.7%. The ASX200 closed its Thursday session down -0.1%. But the NZX50 ended up +0.1%.<\/p>\n The price of gold<\/a> will start today at US$3,391\/oz, up US$17 from yesterday.<\/p>\n American oil prices have slipped back again, down another -US$1 to just on US$64\/bbl with the international Brent price down at just over US$66.50\/bbl.<\/p>\n The Kiwi dollar is at 59.5 USc and up +10 bps from yesterday. Against the Aussie we are up +20 bps at 91.5 AUc. Against the euro we are up +10 bps at 51.1 euro cents. That all means our TWI-5 starts today at just on 67.3, up +20 bps.<\/p>\n The bitcoin price started today at US$116,442 and up +0.8% from this time yesterday. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been modest at just under +\/-1.1%.<\/p>\n Select chart tabs<\/p>\n US$ \n The easiest place to stay up with event risk is by following our Economic Calendar here \u00bb<\/a>.<\/p>\n
\n AU$
\n TWI
\n \u00a5en
\n \u00a5uan
\n \u20acuro
\n GBP
\n Bitcoin<\/p>\n
\n ![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/soil-moisture-2025-08-06.gif\" "\\"click")
<\/a>\n<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/what-do-you-think-11.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Here’s our summary of key economic events overnight that affect New Zealand, with news we are ending the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52529,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[64,63,99,164],"class_list":["post-52528","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52528\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}