{"id":382007,"date":"2026-04-16T06:06:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T06:06:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/382007\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T06:06:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T06:06:17","slug":"oil-shock-could-force-rates-higher-says-rba-deputy-governor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/382007\/","title":{"rendered":"Oil shock could force rates higher, says RBA deputy governor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The comments come about six weeks into the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mpamag.com\/au\/news\/general\/oil-shock-troubles-donald-trump-redoubles-aussie-mortgage-holders-navigating-a-sea-of-wildcards\/568324\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">oil shock<\/a>, which the has pushed up prices at the bowser, lifted inflation and hit both consumer and business sentiment in Australia.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Andrew Hauser of the Reserve Bank of Australia\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/0376_639118492386708440.png\" style=\"width: 30%; height: 30%; margin-left: 5px; margin-right: 5px; float: right;\"\/>\u201cIt\u2019s obvious that inflation is going up in the short term, and people are very conscious of that,\u201d Hauser (pictured right) said.\u00a0\u201cWe are almost wholly reliant on imports for oil and we are the highest user of diesel per capita in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The cash rate has already risen twice this year, to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mpamag.com\/au\/news\/general\/rba-raises-cash-rate-to-385\/563974\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">3.85% in February<\/a> and then to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mpamag.com\/au\/news\/general\/rba-raises-cash-rate-to-41\/568740\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">4.1% in March<\/a>, according to the release. Hauser said there was \u201cnot much monetary policy can do\u201d about near-term inflation spikes, with the central bank instead using rates to limit longer-term risks.<\/p>\n<p>He said the key question for the Reserve Bank was how consumer behaviour would feed into the data, and warned of \u201ca big income shock\u201d\u00a0if activity slowed in line with weakening confidence.<\/p>\n<p>Consumer confidence has fallen since the start of the war,\u00a0while mortgage repayments and property market resilience face added strain. April\u2019s drop in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mpamag.com\/au\/companies\/westpac\/308084\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Westpac<\/a>\u2013Melbourne Institute Consumer Sentiment Index was the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mpamag.com\/au\/news\/general\/australian-business-confidence-flops-to-covid-era-lows\/571608#:~:text=Australia%E2%80%99s%20consumer%20mood%20has%20also%20taken%20a%20fresh%20hit%2C%20with%20the%20Westpac%E2%80%93Melbourne%20Institute%20Consumer%20Sentiment%20Index%20tumbling%2012.5%25%20in%20April%20to%2080.1%20%E2%80%93%20marking%20the%20biggest%20monthly%20decline%20since%20the%20onset%20of%20the%20pandemic%20and%20hitting%20its%20lowest%20level%20in%20nearly%20two%2Dand%2Da%2Dhalf%20years.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">steepest monthly decline<\/a> since the onset of the pandemic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The comments come about six weeks into the oil shock, which the has pushed up prices at the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[138,219,1943,111,139,69,174665,16549],"class_list":{"0":"post-382007","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-economy","10":"tag-inflation","11":"tag-new-zealand","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-oil-shock","15":"tag-rba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}