Global interest rates move lower

<p>Kia ora,</p><p>Welcome to Friday’s Economy Watch where we follow the economic events and trends that affect Aotearoa/New Zealand.</p><p>I'm David Chaston and this is the international edition from Interest.co.nz.</p><p>And today we lead with news global interest rates are on the move.</p><p>The big news is the sharp dive in wholesale benchmark interest rates. And American benchmark <a href="https://www.freddiemac.com/pmms" target="_blank"><strong>mortgage interest rates</strong></a> have fallen below 7% for the first time since August.</p><p>But first, American <a href="https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/OPA/newsreleases/ui-claims/20232600.pdf" target="_blank"><strong>jobless claims fell</strong></a> last week and by more than expected, and back to the low end of the range over the past year. There are now less than 1.8 mln people on this support, also a drop from last week but less than expected, but not enough to change the shallow rising trend.</p><p>As earlier indicators had suggested, the US holiday season retail impulse was good. Now the official <a href="https://www.census.gov/retail/marts/www/marts_current.pdf" target="_blank"><strong>retail sales data for November</strong></a> is out and that confirms the earlier data. Value levels were up +4.1% from a year ago, so there has likely been an expanding retail volume too.</p><p>And you can see the impact of that demand on <a href="https://www.census.gov/mtis/www/data/pdf/mtis_current.pdf" target="_blank"><strong>business inventories</strong></a>, which fell - a small slip from October, true, but one that wasn't expected. From a year ago they were up +0.5% in value terms, so clearly falling in volume terms.</p><p>In Canada, their <a href="https://stats.crea.ca/en-CA/" target="_blank"><strong>housing market sales</strong></a> are retreating, even if the shrinkage is still small.</p><p><a href="https://www.cbc.gov.tw/en/cp-448-164972-f0cde-2.html" target="_blank"><strong>Taiwan's central bank</strong></a> kept its policy rate at 1.875%.</p><p>In Hong Kon