The SME Stream

The new year is well and truly under way, and there's growing hopeful predictions about the state of the economy.

GDP is projected to grow by 2.5 percent, according to new reports from HSBC.

HSBC chief economist Paul Bloxham explained further.

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New reports show China's 2025 birth rate was lower than expected, and that's impacted A2 Milk's shares.

Data out of China revealed there were 5.63 live births per 1000 people in 2025 - the country’s lowest reading since 1939 and the fourth straight year of declines.

Forsyth Barr analyst Matt Montgomerie says A2 Milk was halted on the Australian stock exchange, prompting further concerns. 

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It’s all rain and no shine this week across the country.

Warm, tropical air sitting north of New Zealand has brought with it thunderstorms and rain warnings for Northland, Auckland, Great Barrier Island and the Coromandel Peninsula.

Crews have already been working on clearing slips along State Highway 2, between Ōpōtiki and Gisborne.

So, what is the outlook for this week? And when will Mother Nature give us all a break?

Today on The Front Page, Niwa principal scientist, Chris Brandolino is with us to take us through what to expect, and when we might be able to put the sheets on the line.

Follow The Front Page on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can read more about this and other stories in the New Zealand Herald, online at nzherald.co.nz, or tune in to news bulletins across the NZME network.

Host: Chelsea Daniels
Editor/Producer: Richard Martin
Producer: Jane Yee

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Jamie Mackay talks to Cameron Bagrie, Dominic Jones, Tom Young, Jo Luxton, and Tom Martin.

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In his state of the nation speech yesterday, Christopher Luxon continued the great New Zealand tradition of kicking the retirement age can down the road.

He said raising the retirement age was “inevitable”. But that was it. And, when I say kicking the can, it was more like nudging the can with his foot really. Because what the Prime Minister and every other politician should be doing, is showing some fortitude and accepting that tweaking with the retirement age is never going to be enough.

What I think we should be doing, is telling people who are 35 and younger right now, that they’ll have to provide for themselves completely when they retire because there won’t be a NZ Super pension.

That’s what needs to happen. Instead of increasing the age of entitlement by one year or two years, we should ditch the scheme completely. But over a sustained period of time.

Because the problem we’re trying to solve is the fact that it is completely unsustainable.

By the end of the decade, we’re going to be spending $30 billion a year on NZ Super and, as economist Brad Olsen said recently, every other thing in the government’s budget will be “rats and mice”.

So, if we are serious about leaving a legacy for future New Zealanders - which is something the Prime Minister talked about a lot in his speech yesterday - we need to make sure that legacy doesn’t include lumbering future generations with an unsustainable state pension scheme.

But, the way we’re going, nothing’s going to change. Because politicians seem to be terrified of doing anything meaningful. Whereas, what I’m talking about would be meaningful.

It would have no immediate impact, given it would only apply to people 35-and-younger now. But you can’t underestimate the long-term benefits.

I know doing away with NZ Super would be huge. But we can’t afford to be all sentimental about it.

We have to face the reality that the way we do things now - and the way we’ve been doing things - can’t continue forever.

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As prices for everyone's favourite sweet treat soar, chocolate makers are searching to find cheaper alternatives. 

A Rabobank report reveals manufacturers are exploring ways to replace cocoa beans, including lab-grown options, as climate pressures disrupt supply and make global cocoa prices rise. 

Raglan Chocolate Head Maker Mike Renfree told Andrew Dickens the commodity price of cocoa has been double what it was in 2023, but it's mostly impacting the large multi-nationals.  

He says it was $2 a kilo in 2023, went up to $12 a kilo in 2024 and 2025, and it's now lower down at $5, but there's a lag in the system.  

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A superannuation expert suggests the Government looks across the ditch for ways to maintain the retirement age.  

The Prime Minister took the opposite stance during his State of the Nation speech in Auckland yesterday afternoon.  

Christopher Luxon says as life expectancy rises, the pension age of 65 is too low.  

Jonathan Eriksen told Andrew Dickens Australia introduced compulsory superannuation in 1991 with 3% employer contribution.  

He says it now has trillions of dollars, which it invests in infrastructure and tourism. 

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The Retirement Commissioner is asking for a careful and considered approach for changing the retirement age.

During his State of the Nation speech yesterday, the Prime Minister said increasing the retirement age was inevitable.

Christopher Luxon says as life expectancy rises, the pension age of 65 is too low.

Jane Wrightson told Mike Hosking it's good it is now on the political agenda, so the people can hear ideas from all parties.

She says political parties will need to discuss what the next decade will look like, and they need to carefully look at how all people will be affected by any changes. 

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Election Year is off and running with Christopher Luxon’s State of the Nation address. 

We should know the election date later this week. 

What we do know is the theme of National’s campaign: “Fixing the basics and building the future”. 

Not a shock.

It’s a variation of the way they’ve positioned themselves for a while. The party that concentrates on the need to haves and not the nice to haves - Labour trashed the economy in six years with their spending, we’re the guys who’ll fix it up. 

But the real question is what are they fixing and what are they building. 

Treasury’s figures from the Half Yearly Economic and Fiscal Update delivered just before Christmas, show the Government has both cut capital expenditure since its election and lowered forecasts for new spending.

Capex fell by $6 billion between the 2023/24 and 2024/25 fiscal years, and spending was $1.6 billion less in 2024/25 than was budgeted. 

There’s not a lot of fixing of leaky hospitals and rickety courtrooms going on.

And yet despite that, their spending has gone up.

And that’s because the big ticket items like benefits and pensions have gone up, and so have costs in services like education and health.

So there’s not a lot of invigorating news in the near future.  

Our fundamentals will remain unchanged. The great hope is that private sector just gets on with it understanding the limits to our capacity.

And so we get back to the unofficial slogan: "Vote for us, we’re not as bad as the other lot". 

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Last time you heard from us, we talked budgets—how to stop feeling trapped and build a budget that suits you. Today’s episode is a little different: an extra chapter to tell one guy’s story.

We return to Reagan White from Where’s My Money with a tale of brutal interest rates and a mortgage that suddenly feels way less manageable. Reagan shares how close he came to losing everything—and how budgeting became a life raft to get back to safety.

This is the fourth episode of the Wealth Kick, a limited series to change your perspective on money for the new year. Until the end of January, we’re serving up a little financial soul-searching, easy exercises you can use anywhere, and a few wacky stories.

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