Forum Archive Index - February 2004

["winner69 ." <wwinner69@hotmail.com>]

The good old NZ$ hits US$0.70 cents and most pundits say it will probably go 
higher as the US$ continues to slide.

Exporters bemoaning these events and the good old Govt sympathises with 
them.

Personally life for me is heaps better with a high (strong?) NZ$.

Life was a misery when it was below US$0.40 only a few years ago. Exporters 
were happy as was the Govt when it saw our current account deficit fall to 
acceptable levels.

But no one showed much sympathy to those who hurt really badly because they 
imported raw materials and couldn't pass on these extra costs.

Never mind - the world goes in cycles doesn't it.

What is being played out now seems so predictable - so much so what will 
actually happen will probably be unpredictable.

Our old friend Greenspan did say the other day "When the future surprises, 
history tells us, it often surprises us all"

All I know that NZ is a country living beyond it means. Like Americans we 
continue to spend and are becoming more and more in debt. We live in a 
country where most have all the latest whizz bangi things but in a lot of 
cases basic infrastructure thiings are under pressure because the country 
can't afford to keep them up to scratch.

As a country we only seem to compete on price. As such we need our dollar to 
be below US$0.40 cents - and that isn't really that good for the country 
either.

A strong currency surely is a good thing - as long as it doesn't cause pain 
to some. If the currency was worth what it is today because we had used our 
creativity to add real value to our natural resources than that would be 
fantastic. We would deserve to have that strong currency.

However until we, as a country, are capable of doing that our dollar will 
inevitiably be back down at US$0.40 - or is that too predictable?

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