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
TSB lowered all its fixed rates from 2 to 5 years today. TSB’s 4.39% one year rate remains a market leader. Kainga Ora raised all its rates, including it floating rate (by +10 bps). All current mortgage 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
There are no changes to report today. But it is probably worth noting that Kiwi Bond rates haven’t changed since October 16, 2025. In those 4+ months the six month and 12 month wholesale rates have changed little, but the 2 and 4 year wholesale rates have risen more than +25 bps. All updated term deposit rates less than 1 year are here, for 1-5 years, they are here.

STRONG LEVEL OF BUILDING CONSENTS ISSUED
Residential building consents were up +14.8% in January compared to January last year with the residential building industry making a strong start to 2026. (If these housing units get built, it is a good sign for housing affordability. A rapidly expanding stock of houses at the same time as weak-to-no demographic pressures (low birth rate and low immigration) can only mean lower prices for newer dwellings.)

QUARTERLY TRACKING UPDATED
Update: We have updated our quarterly residential building consent tracking to December 2025, which you can find here. There are some notable trends in these.

NON-RES CONSENTS HANG IN THERE
Meanwhile, non-residential building had a steady start to 2026, with the value of consents in January up +4.5% from a year earlier.

NEW CAR SALES RISE MODESTLY
In February, there were 7138 new cars sold, +2.0% more than in the same month a year ago. The share that were SUV’s exceeded 82% again. Hybrids and EVs accounted for less than half for the first time since May 2025 with a small resurgence in ICE vehicle sales. Of note is the doubling (to 674) of sales to rental car fleets, year-on-year. Used imports have stayed at their lowish level, 6956 in February, a level they have been at broadly since late 2024.

COMPARING BANKS
The RBNZ Dashboard for the December 2025 quarter has been released. This allows comparison by bank of their financial results and market shares, which we will analyse and report on over the next few days. Our our Key Bank Metric tool that is powered by this data is here (and updated now).

TAKE A BREAK AND DO OUR QUIZ
Our quiz has been updated for this week’s edition. You can do it here. And a new one will be added every Monday.

NZX50 DIPS
As at 3pm, the overall NZX50 index is down -0.2% so far today. That leaves it up +0.6% over the past five working days, up +4.2% from six months ago. From a year ago it is now up +8.6%. Market heavyweight F&P Healthcare is down -0.7% so far today. Tourism Holdings, Vista, Hallensteins and Fletcher lead the NZX50 gains while Vulcan Steel, Auckland Airport, Argosy Property and Infratil are the main decliners.

LOOKING AHEAD TO THE GDT DAIRY AUCTION
There is another full dairy auction tomorrow, but the new sudden geopolitical backdrop may play a part – especially with shipping costs. Will the buyer or seller bear these via a price adjustment? The butter price jumped from the last full auction to the intermediate Pulse auction. But derivates market pricing suggests it will fall back again. SMP rose between those two prior events and the derivatives market suggests another good rise tomorrow. But the dominant WMP fell marginally from the auction two weeks ago to the Pulse event a week ago. And derivatives pricing suggests another, larger fall.

LESS HOUSING SUPPLY COMING
In Australia, total residential building consents fell at a -7.2% rate in January, following a -30.7% drop in December. Year on year it is down -15.7%, the largest fall since late 2023. This may have ended the rising trend of approvals that started in July 2024. But there were 9,900 detached houses approved for construction nationally, a 41 month high. The big shortfall is in intensive housing.

LARGER CURRENT ACCOUNT DEFICIT
Australia’s current account balance fell by -AU$2.8 bln in December 2025 to a deficit of -AU$21.1 bln. This is its second consecutive fall, driven by a net primary income deficit widening. This will take -0.1 percentage points from the December 2025 GDP result which will be released tomorrow.

HARD TO FIGHT INFLATION WHEN THE WORLD IS AFLAME
In public comments today, the RBA governor acknowledged the sudden increase in uncertainty in the global economy, on top of already high uncertainty from Trump’s abandonment of an international rules-based order. She said “a supply shock could, for example, add to inflation pressures. And the potential implications for inflation expectations are something we are very alert to. But at the same time, a prolonged impact on energy markets could have adverse effects on global economic activity and result in downward pressure on inflation. It is not obvious how this might play out.” Westpac says Brent crude at US$100 is entirely possible in the coming few weeks.

SWAP RATES UP
Wholesale swap rates are probably rising today as risk premiums rise. Keep an eye on our chart below which will record the final positions closer to 5pm. The 90 day bank bill rate was unchanged at 2.49% on Monday and has been like this for ten days straight. Today, the Australian 10 year bond yield is up +10 bps at 4.75% in risk signals. The China 10 year bond rate is down -4 bps at 1.79%. The Japanese 10 year bond is up +3 bps at 2.12% today. The NZ Government 10 year bond rate is now at 4.43%, up +7 bps from Monday with the same risk-cost rise as in Australia. The RBNZ data is now ‘prior day’ with Monday rate up +2 bps at 4.35%. The UST 10yr yield is up +8 bps from this time yesterday, now at 4.04%. All eyes remain on the US credit spreads which are rising on top of this.

EQUITIES MIXED BUT NOT CRASHING
The local equity market has dipped -0.2% in Tuesday trade. But the ASX200 is down -1.3% in afternoon trade. Tokyo has started its week down another -1.4% in its opening trade. Hong Kong is down a lesser -0.4% mirrored by Shanghai . Singapore has bounced back +1.0%. Wall Street ended its Monday trade with the S&P500 unchanged.

OIL RISES AGAIN
American oil prices are up another +$2.50 at just under US$72/bbl, while the international Brent price is now just over US$78.50/bbl.

CARBON PRICE HOLDS
There have been few trades today on the secondary market, and the price is unchanged at $47/NZU. See our daily chart tracker of the NZU price for carbon, courtesy of emsTradepoint.

GOLD FIRMS, SILVER EASES
In early Asian trade, gold has risen from this time yesterday, up +US$13/oz and now at US$5341/oz and almost back to its January 29 record high. Silver is down -US$5 at just under US$88/oz.

NZD FALLS
The Kiwi dollar is down just -40 bps from this this time yesterday against the USD, now at just under 59.5 USc. Against the Aussie we are down -60 bps at 83.7 AUc. Against the euro we unchanged at 50.8 euro cents. This all means the TWI-5 is now just under 63 and down -40 bps from this morning.

BITCOIN RISES
The bitcoin price is now at US$68,725 and up +3.3% from this time yesterday. Volatility has been high, at +/- 3.2%.

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