While increasing the OCR this morning, Reserve Bank Governor Alan Bollard has indicated that future hikes won't be as aggressive as earlier tipped.

The NZ dollar has tumbled this morning, after Reserve Bank governor Alan Bollard signalled that future interest rate rises will be more modest than earlier indicated.

Bollard's statement carried a thinly veiled warning about the consequences of passing on GST increases.

The NZ dollar climbed to a six-month high as a surge in new home sales in the US stoked investors' appetite for higher-yielding, or riskier, assets.

It's clear the economy has become dependent on the debt growth fuelled by the housing market's ever-increasing values.

The New Zealand dollar may advance as traders eschew an out-of-favour greenback and seek growth assets Downunder this week.

The Reserve Bank is tipped to raise the Official Cash Rate next week, despite lower than expected economic growth.

Shares across Europe rose yesterday amid hopes that most of the continent's 91 top banks will pass EU-mandated 'stress tests'.

Over a third of kiwi households will have to use credit to pay for otherwise unaffordable expenses if the Reserve Bank increases interest rates in the coming months, according to a new survey.

New Zealanders wrote one-third fewer cheques last year than they did six years earlier, as consumers opted for quicker payment methods.

Stocks in the US advanced as better-than-anticipated earnings outweighed a decline in homebuilder confidence.

Solid earnings data from corporate America has done little to ease investors' concerns that growth in the world economy is slowing.

NZers will look back on the winter of 2010 as the moment we finally realised the last decade of growth was a sham.