The SME Stream

$584m traded on Friday versus a normal day in the low $100m region. Matt Goodson Salt Funds Management.

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Workplace harm's costing the country billions of dollars a year.  

A report from the Business Leaders Health and Safety Forum has found workplace harm cost the country $5.5 billion in 2025.  

Forum Chief Executive Francois Barton says that's made up of a mix of injuries, illness and deaths. 

He told Ryan Bridge the industries with the highest rate of harm are the primary industries – construction, farming, manufacturing, and areas in transport and logistics. 

Barton says the blueprint for safety isn't more helmets, hi-vis, and checklists, it's about how we can change the work itself to make it safer. 

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Modest 3.2 point lift to 86.3 in employment confidence in September quarter survey by Westpac and McDermot Miller.

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The Finance Minister believes the report on the Reserve Bank's performance during Covid affirms decisions made by the current Government. 

An external review of Bank's Covid monetary policy during the pandemic finds it was right to cut the OCR early but was slow to react when the economy bounced back sooner than expected. 

Nicola Willis told Mike Hosking the results show the importance of the guardrails they implemented – having a single inflation-busting mandate and the change to voting to create more accountability. 

She believes the report matters as it also shows the Reserve Bank can keep getting better as long as it has an attitude of ongoing improvement.

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The Reserve Bank took too long to pull back on drastic Covid measures.  

An independent probe's found the Monetary Policy Committee made the right call by slashing the OCR early in the pandemic, reducing the risk of a severe downturn.   

But it didn't respond quickly enough to our recovery, leading to the spike in inflation. 

ASB Senior Economist Mark Smith joined Ryan Bridge to unpack the findings. 

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Credit cards accounted for 71.1% of card transactions in August — their highest share in more than two decades.

Does that reflect renewed confidence, the convenience of online spending, or are more New Zealanders relying on debt simply to make ends meet?

Liam Dann and Tamsyn Parker examine what the figures reveal about household finances, how election uncertainty could slow the economic recovery, and why property prices may not return to their 2021 peak until 2029.

The Economy of Everything is made in partnership with CMC Markets.

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A damning report into the Reserve Bank’s actions during Covid, a backdown from Labour on landlord tax breaks, and a last look at the Government’s books before the election.

That’s all ahead of the much-hyped release of a new book from Nicky Hager tonight.

NZ Herald Wellington business editor Jenée Tibshraeny joins us to break it all down.

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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/Producer: Katie Bradford
Producer: Jane Yee
Editor/Producer: Richard Martin

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The Minister of Trade and Agriculture celebrates the ratification of the Indian FTA. Could it be, as the Prime Minister suggested, a free trade agreement that far exceeds expectations? And does he face a challenge from Andrew Hoggard for his agriculture portfolio?

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Labour leader Chris Hipkins on his landlord tax deduction

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Pulse of NZ Business Survey shows recovery continuing but it's uneven across sectors, regions and business sizes. Ben Crozier Forsyth Barr.

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