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New Zealand government bonds rallied at the time of closing Thursday on continuing signal from a subdued dairy supply outlook despite an improvement in the global dairy prices at the country’s latest GlobalDairyTrade Price auction held lately. Elsewise, trading remained sideways as investors refrained from engaging in any major trading activity amid a muted session.
At the time of closing, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves inversely to its price, slumped 1-1/2 basis points to 2.79 percent, the yield on 20-year slipped 1 basis point to 3.23 percent and the yield on short-term 2-year ended nearly flat at 1.95 percent.
The Australian and New Zealand dollars held near multi-week highs on Friday as optimism on global growth supported risk appetites and commodity prices. Prices for other major commodity exports, including copper, coal and liquefied natural gas, have also been trending higher in the last couple of months.
The New Zealand dollar had no data to worry about and hung onto all its gains on a broadly softer US currency. It was last at US$0.7150, just off an 11-week top of US$0.7163.
Lastly, the Global Dairy Trade Price Index (GDT) gained 2.2 percent at the first auction of the year, after the world’s biggest dairy processor, Fonterra, dropped its forecast for NZ milk collection last week for the second time in as many months. The average selling price was of NZD3,124 per tonne, with prices for whole milk powder - the most widely traded product - posting the strongest gain, 4.2 percent.
Meanwhile, the NZX 50 index closed 0.14 percent higher at 8,455.55, while at 06:00GMT, the FxWirePro's Hourly NZD Strength Index remained neutral at 37.18 (a reading above +75 indicates a bullish trend, while that below -75 a bearish trend). For more details, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex
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