Join us now for the weekly hoon

Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale are joined by Robert Patman to chew over the PM's big speeches, the MI5/FBI warning of China's corporate espionage, & ANZ' Finn Robinson on awful consumer confidence trends

TLDR: Paid subscribers can join Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale for their live weekly zoom webinar called The Hoon (plural of Kākā) at 5pm for an hour, where they gallivant around the week’s news in geo-politics and the global (and local) political economy. It starts at 5pm and the link to join is below the paywall fold.

This week they host regular guest Otago University’s Professor Robert Patman to chew over:

• British PM Boris Johnson’s demise (finally);

• PM Jacinda Ardern's two big foreign policy speeches at Chatham House in London and the Lowy Institute in Sydney, which struck different tones on China, Russia and our independent foreign policy;

• the unprecedented joint warning in public from the bosses of MI5 and FBI to business leaders in a speech in London warning of China's corporate espionage; and,

• a preview of next week’s Pacific Islands Forum, where China’s recent attempt to pull various Island nations into its sphere of influence will be at the top of the agenda, along with how Australia, Aotearoa-NZ and the United States can do more on climate change and elsewhere to push back.

Also, Bernard Hickey talks with special guest ANZ economist Finn Robinson on the curiously weak noises coming from consumers, despite unemployment being at 3.2% and household incomes actually outpacing inflation in consumer prices. Finn wrote this excellent note this week on the issue.

We may also discuss:

• the big four banks cutting their two year mortgage rates by around 30-40 basis points to around 5.45% after two year wholesale ‘swaps’ rates fell 80 basis points from their June 16 peak of 4.56% in response to cooling global economic growth and inflation expectations in recent weeks;

• the fall in commodity prices to pre-war levels as fears grow that the ‘demand destruction’ from inflation’s post-war spike and much-higher interest rates are doing the central banks’ work for them;

• the Government announcing plans to appoint a single Grocery Commissioner inside the Commerce Commission in the hope of doing a ‘2 Degrees’ on the groceries duopoly of Foodstuffs (Pak’n’Save/New World/Four Square) and Woolworths (Countdown); and,

• the Infrastructure Commission telling the Government and Wellington’s Councils that their choice of $7.4b of tunnels for ‘Lets Get Wellington Moving’ was not the best option for reducing carbon emissions, although the Councils approved it nevertheless.

I also shot the breeze about this issues above and more with paid subscribers here earlier today in our weekly Ask Me Anything for an hour at midday.

Ask Me Anything about the week to July 8