Down however undoubtedly not out could be one interpretation of the newest bank card spending figures for the month of August.
Reserve Bank figures present bank card billings in New Zealand dropped a seasonally-adjusted 5.8% in August as Auckland went into stage Three lockdown and the remainder of the nation stage 2.
The billings for the month had been somewhat underneath $3.6 billion, which was $485 million lower than on the identical time final yr – however the newest month’s figures in fact had New Zealand’s largest metropolis in a ‘lockdown lite’ from August 12 onwards – which suggests customers are adapting spending patterns to the Covid restrictions.
The RBNZ mentioned the efficient bank card rate of interest on all private money owed fell by 20 foundation factors to 9.9% which is the bottom on report.
Earlier this yr, within the full lockdown month of April complete month-to-month bank card billings in New Zealand fell a whopping 41.3% to $2.1 billion (seasonally adjusted).
Whereas month-to-month bank card spending recovered strongly after the nation had emerged from the complete lockdown in April, the quantities excellent on bank cards are nonetheless nicely down on the place they had been a yr in the past. We have paid off debt and we have stored the debt off, comparatively.
On the finish of April the quantity excellent fell, on a seasonally adjusted foundation to about $5.9 billion. April noticed the most important month-to-month fall on report and introduced billings again to ranges final seen in 2006. They’ve since been rising once more however not by a lot. And in August they fell once more.
As of August, the full advances excellent fell 2.6% on a seasonally-adjusted foundation in contrast with July to $6.2 billion.
That is 16% decrease than August 2019 excellent stability of almost $7.four billion.
