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Happy New Year. I’m David Chaston with Ninety at nine, brought to you by interest.co.nz.
This is where you get everything you need to know in 90 seconds at 9 o’clock, including
news of a bump in the road for US jobs.
The news generally over the summer break has been positive, although that run came to an
end on Saturday.
The latest US non-farm payrolls report, the first of the year, came with big disappointment.
The earlier, non-official private ADP-Moodys report had suggested US December payroll growth
was strong, very strong. But the official data was the reverse. These surveys do jump
around a bit, so markets are treating the reading cautiously. As is the Fed, it appears.
However, it was enough to push the gold price higher, towards US$1,250/oz. Most other benchmarks
reacted little, but the US Treasury 10 yr bond yields fell quite sharply. It was almost
touching 3% before the news, but fell back to 2.86%.
At the Fed, Janet Yellen is the new boss, replacing Ben Bernanke. The White House announced
over the weekend that Stanley Fischer, the ex Bank of Isreal governor, will be appointed
as her deputy.
In China, their December trade surplus result was out on Saturday and was smaller than expected,
but still large. Exports rose far slower than imports, compared with the same month a year
earlier. Their officials focused on the year-on-year result shying away from the recent slowdown
in exports as domestic costs rise quickly.
The NZ dollar starts today at 83.0 USc, 92.4 AUc, and the TWI is at 78.3 - all quite similar
to where they left off just before Christmas.
If you want to catch up with all the changes over the past three weeks, we have an update
here.
I’m David Chaston, and that was the first 90 at nine for 2014, brought to you by interest.co.nz.
Its good to be back.