Cost pressures continued to ease for the transport sector in the March 2024 quarter. Diesel prices were 3.5% lower than in the December 2023 quarter, while finance costs edged lower for the second consecutive quarter. Labour costs recorded their smallest quarterly increase in more than three years, ... Read

Electric vehicle (EV) uptake in New Zealand has been accelerating over the last few years. Uptake was helped along with financial incentives including the Clean Car Discount scheme and the exemption of EVs from paying road user charges (RUC). With the discount scheme gone and EV owners about to start paying RUC, the trajectory is likely to change. Read

Global diesel prices have surged significantly over the last few months. Driven largely by supply constraints, our Chart of the Month shows how this surge has led to a significant import cost premium over petrol. Elevated diesel prices will have ripple effects throughout both the global and local economies, and risk inflation remaining higher for longer. Read

A constrained global supply of diesel has led to a substantial increase in prices over the last few months, both for importers, and at the pump. Higher diesel costs threaten to intensify inflationary pressures, with geopolitical concerns adding further upside risk. In this article, we outline the issues facing the current diesel market, and the outlook over the remainder of 2023 and into 2024. Read

Although the international tourism rebound for New Zealand has been strong, there has been little assessment of how domestic flight activity has been tracking. Despite some challenges, domestic air travel remains stronger than international travel, but is being squeezed by higher inflation, rapidly ... Read

The full fuel excise duty returned on 1 July 2023, which provisionally added 28.5c/L to the domestic price of regular petrol. However, the price of regular petrol was still 53c/L lower than this time last year, as the substantial decline in fuel prices since July 2022 means prices are sharply down even though the fuel tax is no longer discounted. Read

The recent announcement by Saudi Arabia, a major oil producing nation, of further cuts to production at a recent OPEC+ meeting have raised expectations that crude oil prices might rise in response. In isolation, a cut to production would likely increase the price of crude – an outcome that Saudi Ara... Read

Demand for rental cars dried up over the COVID-19 pandemic, as tourist arrivals plummeted. With reduced demand, there was a swift decline in the size of the rental car fleet. Registrations of new rental cars have generally been trending upwards since 2021, but they still remain below pre-pandemic le... Read

Between April and December last year, Clean Car Discount fees totalled $105m and rebates totalled $203m, which means the scheme distributed nearly double the revenue it brought in. The Discount scheme was designed to be self-funding, so the gap between fees and rebates needs to be addressed. To close the funding gap, the most straightforward approach would be to either lower the level of rebates, increase the level of fees, or a combination of the two. Read

Over the last two years, consumers have experienced high inflation across a wide range of goods and services. Car owners, and prospective buyers, are no exception, as vehicle-related prices have risen strongly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Higher prices for new and used cars have put pre... Read