TLDR: House price deflation hit double-digits for Auckland and Wellington in April, but business leaders, forecasters and households are yet to buy the Reserve Bank’s suggestions that a 30% fall is feasible, or even that the ‘sustainable’ level of house prices is still another 5-20% below the already lower levels. (Paid subscribers can see more detail and my analysis of this below the paywall fold and in the podcast above)
Elsewhere in the news overnight and this morning:
European gas prices jumped 14% overnight after Russia shut off gas going to Europe via a pipeline through Poland, adding to the shortages caused earlier in the week by a major pipeline through Ukraine being closed Reuters;
Russia threatened “military-technical” measures in retaliation to the decision overnight by Finland to apply for NATO membership, with Sweden saying it expected to apply for membership on Monday Reuters; and,
crypto-currency and decentralised finance markets are in turmoil this morning after the collapse of the Terra-USD stablcoin this week pushed the biggest stablecoin, Tether, below its US$1 peg and shunted bitcoin down to US$25,401, its lowest level since the end of 2020. Reuters CNBC
FYI for paid subscribers, a reminder that I’ll be sending email invites to my weekly Ask Me Anything session just before midday today and the weekly ‘hoon’ with Peter Bale and special guests before 5pm today (repeat 5pm not 4pm). The link invite to the hoon on zoom is also below the fun thing.
Also: a reminder to free subscribers reading here that we have a special $30 a year deal for under 30s and that students and teachers should sign up for the free tier using their ‘school’ or ‘ac’ email addresses to get converted to the full subscription for free. And we have a new special $65 a year deal for over 65s who are reliant on NZ Superannuation.
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