As New Zealand economy is on the verge of a recession this has put the NZD under significant pressure across the main currency board including the Australian Dollar (AUD) of late. As the two central bank’s policy diverge- the RBNZ aggressively hiking and the RBA holding policy on April 4th we have seen the NZD/AUD cross come off 0.9440 (1.0595) to 0.9155 (1.0922) today. The toll on consumers has been evident while across the Tasman the mood is somewhat brighter. Stronger than expected Chinese GDP and an overall better optimistic economic tone have helped push the Aussie higher together with better commodity prices such as iron ore which has gone from 113.00 this week to 121.50 per tonne. NZ inflation for the first quarter of 2023 came in better than predicted at 1.2% from 1.7% consensus changing the year-on-year inflation number to 6.7% from 7.2%. The kiwi could remain on the backfoot ahead of next week’s Aussie inflation release Wednesday.
The current interbank midrate is: NZDAUD 0.9153 AUDNZD 1.0915
The interbank range this week has been: NZDAUD 0.9157- 0.9283 AUDNZD 1.0772- 1.0920