Dec 15 , 2017  -  New Zealand's labour force is projected to keep growing, driven by an increasing population and people working into older ages, Stats NZ said today. The labour force includes both employed and unemployed people. Currently 2.6 million people are in the labour force. The new projections indicate a total labour force of around 3.0 million in 2030 and 3.5 million in 2068. People aged 65 years and over (65+) will make up an increasing share of the labour force. In 1991, just 1 percent of the labour force was aged 65+. Currently the 65+ share is…

Dec 15,  2017  - Mr Renner is also President of Business Central, representing businesses in the lower North Island and upper South Island.  He replaces outgoing BusinessNZ President Tony Sewell of the Canterbury Employers’ Chamber of Commerce (CECC).  New Vice-Presidents are Andrew Hunt of the Employers & Manufacturers' Association (EMA) and Andrew Leys of the Otago Southland Employers' Association (OSEA). | A BusinessNZ release  ||  December 15, 2017  |||    

Dec 14, 2017  -  Rubicon's proposal to sell a 45 percent stake in local Clearwood manufacturing business falls within the independent adviser's valuation range.  The forestry biotech's shareholders will vote on the transaction at a special meeting in Christchurch on Jan. 12 on whether to approve the sale of its interest in Tenon Clearwood Ltd Partnership for US$14.2 million, which is the cost of its investment in the company in April, plus its share of the reduction in the company's net debt since then. That is estimated to be worth a combined US$15.3 million. The buyers include affiliates of Rubicon's…

Dec 13, 2017  -  The export price of butter reached a new high in the September 2017 quarter, to be up 8.8 percent from the June 2017 quarter, Stats NZ said today.  Export butter prices increased 75 percent in the year ended September 2017, and these gains were closely tracked in domestic butter prices in New Zealand shops. Whole milk powder prices were down 2.0 percent and cheese fell 1.7 percent in the September 2017 quarter. Dairy product export prices as a whole increased 38 percent in the September 2017 year, despite dipping 0.9 percent in the September 2017 quarter.…

Dec 8, 2017  -  Over its long history, Canada’s banking industry has absorbed a range of adjacent players in the sprawling world of financial services: trust companies, investment dealers, property and casualty insurers, and wealth advisors. Many of these structural mergers involved both extensive regulatory reform as well as significant cultural shifts within the industry. Yet as Canada’s banks consolidated and expanded into these other verticals, they tended to impose their cautious ways rather than adopt the more free-wheeling ethic of the smaller players they had raced to acquire. The fintech revolution, however, will demand a complete reboot of this…

Dec 7,  2017  - An article published today in the Reserve Bank Bulletin reviewed the policy responses by overseas central banks to house-price collapses. It was originally written by a contracted researcher, Maitland MacFarlan, as part of the Bank’s general consideration of risks around housing markets. The article considers several episodes of house price collapses around the globe over the last 30 years, a period that encompasses the Nordic financial crises that began in the late 1980s, the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, and the more recent global financial crisis (GFC). The paper focuses on the policy responses…

Dec 7,  2017  - Following on from an Employment Relations Authority (ERA) determination relating to Wendco (NZ) Limited, the Labour Inspectorate is advising businesses that have been following similar processes to take steps to meet their obligations under the Holidays Act.  “As the ERA has indicated, an easy approach for a business to take using ‘blanket rules’ to determine holiday entitlements isn’t the same as a lawful one,” says Payroll Lead Tania Donaldson. “The use of a ‘three week rule’ by Wendco (NZ) Limited to work out entitlements around public holidays meant some employees were not being provided with their…

Dec 7, 2017  - New Zealand's burgeoning fintech sector is coming of age with the likes of the Reserve Bank thinking more deeply about the impact changing technology will have on the broader financial system.  The central bank identified the new wave of fintech as having "the potential to significantly change the structure of the financial sector" in its six-monthly financial stability report last week, singling out blockchain, crypto-currencies, application programming interfaces (APIs), big data and artificial intelligence, and digital platforms for peer-to-peer services among the most important. Head of financial stability Bernard Hodgetts said in an interview last week…

DEc 5, 2017  - Inflation in New Zealand and world-wide has been persistently low since the 2008 global financial crisis, partly because of factors such as globalisation, the growth of China, the rise of the digital economy, and low inflation expectations.  In a speech today to the Institute of Directors, in Auckland, Reserve Bank Governor Grant Spencer said that persistently low inflation has prompted the Reserve Bank to think about whether it needs to tweak it’s approach to monetary policy. Mr Spencer explained a number of significant changes over the past decade have affected the outlook for inflation:  · Globalisation…

Dec 5, 2017  -  Residential building activity volumes rose 4.1 percent in the September 2017 quarter, following a relatively flat period in the first half of the calendar year, Stats NZ said today. This figure excludes the effects of higher construction costs and typical seasonal patterns.  Non-residential building work, from office blocks to factories, also picked up, rising a seasonally adjusted 0.6 percent, following falls in the previous two quarters. Combined, total building activity volumes rose 2.7 percent in the September 2017 quarter compared with the June 2017 quarter. View Graph View Table Percent changeResidential and non-residential building work put…

Dec 5, 2017  -  High profile businessman and social entrepreneur, Tenby Powell, who chaired the government appointed Small Business Development Group for five years, is leading a call for the new Government to establish an Institute for Small Business. The idea for a step-up from government in support of small business is resonating in New Zealand and farther afield says Powell who also represents New Zealand on the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC). “New Zealand needs to do much more to support our small business ecosystem. Small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) account for 97 percent of all enterprises and are…