Weekly Wrap: Educating the younger generation

This week has been quiet, compared to last week's happenings in this financial services industry of ours.A couple of things strike me as being big this week, they include more senior appointments, a bit of debate around tax rules and the one dear to my heart is financial literacy.

Friday, July 4th 2008, 4:33PM

Good Returns ran a story during the week outlining work being led by the Retirement Commission to improve the level of financial literacy in New Zealand. I am sure most readers would agree with me that this is critical. What is important is teaching kids at school about the value of money and it is heartening to see things are happening here. I look at this as being one of those public education campaigns, where we have to look for changes in the younger generations.

Tax seems to be a highly topical issue as advisers and investors get their heads around how to implement changes that came into effect a year ago. As it is the first time they have been used for annual returns there appears to be some differing views on how they work. This story, from earlier in the week, is one take on things. Since we published this piece Good Returns has had quite a bit of feedback from readers. An update will be provided next week and in ASSET Magazine.

Outside, inside out disclosure
The introduction of disclosure statements (DS) is something I have watched with more than a little interest. [more]

On the market front I have to say it has been a bit bearish with Brook Asset Management painting a gloomy picture and Russell not doing much better either.

The third market story is Tyndall's monthly review, which this time looks at emerging markets.

Over in the fixed income space, it's pleasing to see finance companies have been quiet (relatively) this week (and I hope I haven't spoken too soon).

The latest fad – and a worthy one – seems to be cash PIEs, particularly from the banks. Most banks have these products in the market now and some, like Westpac/BT have tweaked their offerings already.

Marac has its bond offer in the market at the moment and there is a useful piece on the offer, and the company, here.

Meanwhile the home loan market is starting to wake up. Yesterday Kiwibank moved to cut its rates and one economist this week talked about more cuts with the two-year fixed rate getting to 8.75% before year's end. To see how all the rates stack up and to compare what is on offer check out the Good Returns Mortgage Centre. Today is the NZMBA Conference in Auckland and we will report on this and the winners of its awards next week.

This week's Insurance News has a range of different articles. One is about a new service to help advisers run the mundane parts of their businesses, another is our latest column from Russell Hutchinson, which is worth a read (and comment if you feel like it), plus on the new product side of things, we have AIG rolling out changed mortgage protection cover.