Best of Business

New data shows there's a subset of Kiwis who are being hit harder than most by rising interest rates.
At least 3600 first home buyers owe more than what their home is worth, but Cotality suspects the number could be higher.
Cotality Chief Property Economist Kelvin Davidson says true number in negative equity is likely to be higher because many bought with a deposit smaller than 20 percent.
"If you live somewhere like Auckland or Wellington, where values are down 25, then you'll sort of be 5 percent in negative equity - which, very quickly...are based on average values. It could be $40,000. something like that. It's not trivial."
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Kiwibank is looking to take on its Australian rivals - and they're looking to reveal how many of their savers are missing out on interest on their 'bonus saver' accounts.
Bonus saver accounts are those where the highest rate of interest is only available if a saver complies with certain requirements like making a deposit each month and not making any withdrawals.
Kiwibank CEO Steve Jurkovich says many savers don't understand how these arrangements work, and the 'complexity' of banking has made it tough for people to understand.
"The real story here is, of course, that life happens. And so, you think you're going to be able to put that money away, you think you're not going to have to touch it - and then, surprise, surprise, something happens and you do need to touch it."
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Here's the headline: "3000 hospitality businesses close in a year".
That’s what the media not only does, but loves. They would perceive it as bad news and they can't pedal bad news enough.
But in the numbers are the real story.
The 3000 is made up of closures and liquidations. A closure can mean nothing more than a person leaving the country or closing one establishment to open another. That happens all the time.
It's not a sign of anything other than mood or inspiration.
It's important to also remember that there are more openings than closures. That’s the real story, so in essence the hospitality scene is actually growing.
Not that a headline about 3000 closures would ever tell you that.
Ironically, it's also perhaps an insight into the reality of hospitality, which is to say it's a very easy entry into business, given a lot of hospitality is hole-in-the-wall sandwich-type stuff, often by migrants, that comes and goes.
So on one hand we are growing and on the other it's an in-and-out sort of operation that is not really reflective of a wider economy, or its story.
The next part of the stats dump is liquidations. They tell us liquidations are up 42% year on year. That sounds bad, until you hear the next number, which is 1.3%.
The 1.3% is the percentage of businesses that actually end up liquidated, which of course is hardly any.
98.7% are not liquidated, so the 42% is off an extremely low base and not, if you were being honest, worthy of a headline.
But remember the key here; it's all about bad news.
Do you want a worse one?
Takeaway liquidations were up 143%. That's a shocker, except, remember that takeaways is a subset of overall liquidations and the liquidations only represent 1.3%. So imagine how small the actual number of fish and chip shops this actually involves is. So, 143% of what?
So, to the narrative. If a headline is all you ever see you will believe we are a dump, it’s a mess and things aren't improving. And yet the truth is a whole different thing.
In these numbers and the narrative is the modern-day story of news and information; what's real versus what they want you to think is real.
It sadly requires work on your part to get to the real story.
And in this case, it is nowhere near as bad as they make out. In fact, it's almost entirely the opposite.
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An industry group for chartered accountants is putting a novel idea on the table to lower the cost of New Zealand Superannuation to the Crown, while keeping it universal.
Chartered Accountants Australia New Zealand is advocating for the next Government to allow people to delay the age at which they start receiving Super.
According to NZIER modelling, this approach could reduce the annual cost of Super to the Crown by billions of dollars every year, depending on how the system was designed.
NZ Herald Wellington business editor Jenee Tibshraeny explained further.
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The Reserve Bank has raised the OCR by 25 basis points to 2.75 percent, in line with economists' expectations.
Markets expected the cash rate would go up, but many had priced in a bigger increase - and there's still an expectation that the OCR could go up further down the track.
Milford Asset Management's Remy Wisenberg explained further.
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