The Question: The Finance Minister, Bill English, says the double downgrade doesn’t mean our economy is weakening, but rather reflects global concern about our levels of foreign debt. Is that the case?

The Response: GARETH MORGAN – New Zealand Financial Analyst

Oh, I think it’s very big, actually, Guyon. I tend to think of it as the second leg of recession after the grand financial crisis. New Zealand’s been in pretty sweet spot, actually, because during the first leg while America and Europe slowed down, China kept going full steam, so all those commodity-producing countries – New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Brazil – they sort of could defy gravity, and we say that reflected in our currency. We’ve seen it reflected in the price of our commodities. I mean, record prices for milk. All the crayfish we make now gets not sold to Japanese – it actually gets sold to Chinese. So, you know, we’re very dependent on China , but China is starting to slow now because China ’s growth has been driven by government investments – state and local government investments in China . And you can only do that for so long, you know, build roads to nowhere and three times as many airports as you need. And so China , on the other hand, is finding that its assets – its foreign assets offshore – are starting to have questionable value because the debt of these countries that it lends to – it’s the lender – are looking increasingly vulnerable. So the whole thing’s starting to impact, and that’s, I think, why the credit agencies have hit New Zealand . It’s because we actually haven’t undergone enough structural reform in this economy to handle a situation where the world comes off. I mean, you know, our balance of payments – deficit’s 3% of GDP at the moment, so it’s come down a long way, but that’s against record terms of trade and a domestic economy and therefore imports that are on their back. So, you know, what’s going to happen – as soon as those terms of trade start falling away, if China slows, you know, this balance of payments and deficit’s going to blow. This external debt’s going to blow. That’s our problem.

Source: here

The Aussie dollar cycle (FXA) which is highly correlated to the Kiwi dollar (BNZ) has more room to fall.

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