NZ heading for deflation, leaving central bank hamstrung, BNZ says

NZ heading for deflation, leaving central bank hamstrung, BNZ says
By Jonathan Underhill Jan. 9 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand economy may be in its first six-month period of deflation in more than a decade, in the face of weak crude oil prices and global over-capacity, pushing the prospects of interest rate hikes out into 2016, according to Bank of New Zealand. Economists at BNZ are forecasting that the consumers price index fell 0.2 percent in the December quarter and will decline 0.3 percent in the first three months of 2015, the first two consecutive quarters of deflation since the same  period of...