Economists debate meaty chunks comment

Economists all reviewed their predictions for an official cash rate (OCR) hike this week in response to Governor Bollard’s speech on Friday where he said “it is possible there could be some meaty chunks to the upside”.

Tuesday, February 2nd 2010, 10:03PM

ANZ Market Focus says "meaty chunks" implies that there will be larger 50 basis point rate hikes early on and alongside BNZ it is picking an OCR hike in June.

Westpac, JP Morgan and ASB however still expect a 25 basis point hike in April.

ANZ Market Focus believes June will be the time for a hike because there are "two preconditions that need to be met before the Reserve Bank starts lifting the OCR"- stabilisation in the labour market with March quarter labour market data not out until May and a pick up in credit growth.

"If credit growth picks up, remove liquidity. If not, maintain the status quo. The credit numbers so far very much call for the status quo."

ASB Business Weekly however believes the Reserve Bank will begin tightening in April with increases of 25 basis points because the relationship between the OCR and lending rates is likely to be a lot firmer than ASB previously assessed.

Westpac's weekly commentary states that we're seven weeks closer to the anticipated starting date of the tightening cycle and by now the timeline is getting fairly short with the changes in language of the Reserve Bank OCR announcement last week aimed at strengthening the message that a tightening cycle is on the way.

JP Morgan believes medium term inflation will become a growing concern for Governor Bollard and that's why it predicts an April hike.

"Annual CPI inflation will likely edge toward the top end of the Reserve Bank's 1% - 3% target range given that domestic prices are rising and excess capacity is diminishing," it says.

All of the economists are also eagerly awaiting the quarterly Household Labour Force Survey which will be released on Thursday for a further steer on where rates are headed.

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