We're going to make a significant allegation today. From all I know and have found out, it is an accurate portrayal of facts. To the extent its true - and I believe it is - Willis should finish up as Finance Minister. Indeed, as a politician of any sort. The bottom line is that after Orr stepped down as Reserve Bank Governor yesterday, Willis saw a window of opportunity to do the bidding for NZ's Big Bank Monopoly. How come? The Reserve Bank now only has a care-taker, lame-duck Acting Governor, in the form of a newly promoted Deputy Governor, who never was meant to be Governor. His main claim to (non) fame was being "part of the team that founded Harbour Asset Management". Oh dear.
So the Finance Minister struck. She jumped into the power vacuum. She twisted RBNZ Board Chair Quigley's arm. In spite of him ranking one of former Governor Orr's greatest "achievements, reflected in the Board’s annual review of his performance" as being "a revision of the capital requirements for banks", Willis has set about reversing them. At the very same time Orr was walking out the RBNZ door, it was announced at a Parliamentary Select Committee, "RBNZ signals U-turn on capital requirements: The Bank is preparing to backtrack on its implementation of capital adequacy ratios". To think that is an RBNZ announcement is naive. Its a National Party Announcement, made out of lobbying pressure by the Big Banks, that has been forced on the Reserve Bank, trashing its independence.
Why? Those RBNZ imposed capital requirements are much hated by the Aussie Big Banks. On that issue, the Acting Governor's views were regarded by Finance Minister Willis as irrelevant. He's not even in the picture. Worse still, Willis wanted to hold off appointing a new, strong, independently minded, highly qualified and experienced new permanent Governor who may not submit to her wishes. The business media report that such an appointment will now be delayed until the review of bank capital requirements is done. Its a thoroughly unacceptable political takeover of Central Bank Independence, using the time between appointments of Governors to rig the system in favour of Big Business. In doing so, Willis quietly ended Reserve Bank of NZ independence this week, on 31 March, 2025.
How come this issue is tense? Because billions of your money are at stake. The Aussie Banks make a disproportionate amount of their profits from NZ - their return on capital is far higher in NZ than in Australia. Why? They have monopoly powers here. They want to squeeze us for more. Although old Governor Orr made a dog's breakfast of monetary policy (setting interest rates) something he got right was one dimension of financial stability. It was the requirement for the Big Banks to hold significant capital reserves so they wont run to the tax-payer for a bail-out should they get into trouble. The Aussie Banks hate the RBNZ capital requirements. Why? It hits their bottom line. Less money for bonuses. Who's been lobbying for them to be relaxed? National's (unofficial) Economic Adviser, the NZ Initiative. Its former Senior Economist is the PM's (and Willis') Adviser. Don't forget how the former ANZ Chair is previous Nat Party PM, John Key, & subsequent ANZ Chairs flew with PM Luxon on trips to Japan and, in the form of Scott St John, to India.
What do the best monetary economists in the world have to say about our RBNZ capital rules? My former colleague at Imperial College London, David Miles, who sat on the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England for many years, reviewed the Reserve Bank of NZ's capital requirements. We chatted before that report, which was called "An Appraisal on the RBNZ's Proposals on Bank Capital". He concludes, "One final point leads me to the conclusion the RBNZ has probably not over-estimated the appropriate level of bank capital. This concerns supervisory philosophy; perhaps strategy is a less pompous term. The RBNZ has adopted a principle of being conservative as regards bank capital to offset possible risks from its light-handed approach to supervision. That is a choice and one partly based on the view that having very large resources devoted to intrusive oversight of banks is not the most efficient road to go down. That is a conclusion that engineers and safety experts often apply when dealing with the design of structures. There is a choice between building bridges many times stronger than you expect them to need to be OR you having large teams of inspectors who pay frequent visits to examine all bridges and monitor flows of traffic over them. It is clear that nearly all countries follow the first strategy".
Furthermore, DownToEarth.Kiwi noted in another Blog how former Chicago, now Stanford University economist, John Cochrane, wrote an article called The More Bank Capital, The Safer the Bank in the Wall Street Journal where he noted, "The banking lobby is furious, as evidenced by recent House testimony & an open letter to federal regulators .. They claim lending will decline .. and growth will suffer. These claims are nonsense .. Even substantially higher capital requirements would have essentially no social cost but greatly reduce chances of another crisis. Better capitalized banks mean a safer, more stable banking system."
Finance Minister Nicola Willis sat on the Board of the NZ Initiative, of which ANZ, Westpac, BNZ and ASB are members, along with Imperial (the Tobacco Company) and BAT (British American Tobacco). Its current Board includes the Chair of Foodstuffs North Island - both Foodstuffs & Woolworths are members. My understanding is that Willis is doing the bidding for Big Business that is driving up the cost-of-living in NZ. She says she wants to come down less hard on the banks by reducing regulation on them to drive competition & lower interest rates, yet at the same time says she wishes to come down more hard on the supermarkets, maybe breaking them up, to lower food prices. The only way to make sense of it is that Willis is in secret cahoots with Big Business whilst pretending to be standing with consumers. Its time she left to save the National Party at the next election.