A business owner who was mistakenly given thousands of dollars by his bank later had his account put into the red without warning.

Westpac NZ's record annual cash profit of $864m confirms a bumper year for the big banks. In fact, at $4.1b, that's almost $1000 for every man, woman and child in NZ.

Westpac NZ has reported a 13 per cent rise in annual cash earnings to $864m helped by a rise in lending and improving bad debts.

The Commerce Commission has missed its own deadline on whether it will file court action against three banks involved in its interest rate swaps probe.

Getting a mortgage is much harder than it was before the global financial crisis. No longer will banks lend willy-nilly.

ANZ New Zealand boosted annual earnings 17 per cent as the local unit of Australia & New Zealand Banking Group benefited from home loan lending growth and bedded down savings from the integration of the National Bank brand.

Banks are offering cash, TVs and furniture vouchers to entice customers into taking out home loans - but experts warn consumers not to be taken in.

A resurgent US dollar and more bearish talk from the Reserve Bank combined to drive the kiwi dollar 2pc lower in active trading this morning.

Business confidence has rebounded in ANZ's monthly survey, the first since the general election.

If the Reserve Bank leaves the official cash rate on hold at 3.5 per cent today it will be the right call, the NZIER's shadow monetary policy board believes.

It is a sign that the times, they are a-changin' when leading central bankers, of all people, are publicly deploring prevailing levels of, and trends in, inequality.

Economists now expect the Reserve Bank to keep interest rates on hold until September next year after inflation in the September quarter proved even more benign than it had forecast.

BNZ chief executive Anthony Healy has thrown his weight behind efforts to clean up New Zealand's polluted waterways.

The Reserve Bank's introduction of limits to low-equity mortgage lending last year had "a dampening" impact on house price inflation, Graeme Wheeler said today.

The Financial Markets Authority is sounding the alarm over cold-callers touting questionable foreign investment schemes to New Zealand consumers.