By Jenny Ruth Jan. 14 (BusinessDesk) - Reserve Bank governor Adrian Orr says stress tests of banks have inherent limitations, suggesting they shouldn’t be relied on. “We emphasise in our public articles that stress testing results should not be read at face value,” Orr says...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 11 (BusinessDesk) - House prices in Australia, particularly in Sydney and Melbourne, are falling sharply and may have further to fall but this is by no means a crisis, according to Chris Rands, a portfolio manager with Nikko Asset Management in Sydney. Ev...

By Nikki Mandow Jan. 11 (BusinessDesk) - After an inordinate amount of hype and years of heart-stopping “Is it coming? Is it not?”, the world’s largest furniture and home furnishings retailer, Ikea, has held a press conference, ostensibly to announce details about the company’...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 11 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar is treading water after US Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell outlined the concerns which are making him more cautious about raising interest rates further. The kiwi was trading at 67.80 US cents at 8.40am in We...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 10 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar softened slightly after technical factors kept a cap on the upside and after weaker than expected producer pricing data in China. The New Zealand dollar eased to 67.87 US cents at 5pm in Wellington from 67.99 at...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 10 (BusinessDesk) - Turners Automotive Group says a lack of used car imports from Japan has meant total used car sales in December were down 6 percent on the same month of 2017. Registrations of used cars imported from overseas fell a much greater 21.6 pe...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 9 (BusinessDesk) - Financial markets have taken the fact that the US-China trade talks in Beijing carried on into a third unscheduled day as a positive, boosting the fortunes of riskier assets including the New Zealand dollar. The kiwi was trading at 67.5...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 9 (BusinessDesk) - The World Bank is predicting global growth will slow this year due to headwinds that include tightening financing conditions, moderating industrial production and intensifying trade tensions. In its semi-annual report on the outlook for...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 9 (BusinessDesk) - Fletcher Building has confirmed it is receiving both “solicited and unsolicited” bids for its Three Kings quarry development, in response to rumours that it may be looking to sell the Auckland site for $150 million Harry Doig, chair of...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 8 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar is treading water near the top of its recent range on speculation the US Federal Reserve will either slow down or pause further rate hikes and hopes for a positive outcome to United States-China trade talks. The N...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 8 (BusinessDesk) - Management fees charged to Vital Healthcare Property Trust are not only out of whack with market norms, they’re also at odds with the way its own trustee’s fees are structured. Even so, Vital’s trustee, Trustees Executors, is paid about...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 7 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar is back to range-trading after a number of calming influences lifted it from last week’s lows. The New Zealand dollar was trading at 67.50 US cents at 5pm in Wellington, just below the day’s high at 67.55 and from...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 7 (BusinessDesk) - Barfoot & Thompson says the tide is turning towards a buyers’ market for Auckland housing. The median price Auckland’s largest real estate agency sold houses for in 2018 was down 0.8 percent on 2017 at $836,792 - the first such decline...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 7 (BusinessDesk) - December retail sales using electronic cards were relatively flat, rising 1.2 percent by value compared with the 5 percent growth shown in the preceding 11 months. The 120.7 million transactions, up 2 percent, were worth more than $6 bi...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 7 (BusinessDesk) - Stress-testing banks has become de rigueur for central banks since the global financial crisis and New Zealand's banks have passed repeated tests over a number of years with flying colours. In addition, these days New Zealand's major ba...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 4 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar is little changed as investors weigh recent extreme volatility and look for some direction from United States equities markets and US employment data due out overnight. The kiwi was trading at 67.02 US cents at 5p...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 4 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar rallied along with most other currencies as plunging stock markets in the United States spurred loss-covering sales of US dollar positions. The kiwi was trading at 66.98 US cents at 8.30am in Wellington from 66.24...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 3 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar was little changed at the end of a wild roller-coaster day driven by a “flash crash” on global currency markets that was probably caused by computer-driven trading in thin, holiday-dampened activity. Meanwhile, ov...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 3 (BusinessDesk) - Australia-based IAG Group says it has increased its catastrophe reinsurance protection for calendar 2019 by A$1 billion to A$9 billion. That includes the 20 percent quota share with Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway which began on Jul...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 3 (BusinessDesk) - Dietary supplements company Promisia Integrative has raised $1.35 million from its 3-for-1 rights issue, well above the underwritten $1.05 million amount, despite the company making no bones of how risky a proposition it is. It’s still...

By Jenny Ruth Jan. 3 (BusinessDesk) - The New Zealand dollar weakened into the New Year amid negative global news such as China threatening Taiwan again and the European Central Bank appointing temporary administrators to run an Italian bank, Banca Carige. The kiwi was trad...

By Jenny Ruth Jan.3 (BusinessDesk) - Vital Healthcare Property Trust’s manager continues to maintain the fiction that Vital and its investors have any agency in determining its future. Effectively, they don’t. This lack of agency, the governance structure, and the fact that...