Online articles

• Conditions align for government issuers within Australia

  A set of circumstances conducive to borrowing has characterised the Australian government sector in the last 12 months. A lower sovereign requirement, regulatory changes and benign market conditions have all provided tailwinds, even as the economy has slowed. KangaNews convened the sector’s largest issuers in Sydney in January to discuss the state of play.

• First in, best dressed

  Government-sector issuers are among Australasia’s most active in the green, social and sustainability (GSS) bond space. They are also responding to increasing investor demand for entity-level environmental, social and governance (ESG) commitments and say they are well placed to provide these despite some negative headlines.

• High-grade issuer profiles and perspectives 2020

  Key data and information on 15 high-grade issuers active in the Australasian debt markets, including funding strategy information, debt data and issuer-specific perspectives. 

• New Zealand issuers comfortable despite larger tasks

  New Zealand’s sovereign and semi-government issuers are facing some of the same challenges as their Australian peers, most notably declining relative yield and larger issuance tasks driven by infrastructure investment. But the trans-Tasman stories are not identical, as New Zealand’s issuers explained at a KangaNews roundtable in Wellington in January.

• QE question time

  In the final weeks of 2019, two letters were on the lips of all participants in the Australian dollar high-grade bond market: QE. With successive rate cuts bringing the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) close to hitting its lower bound, it is understandable that attention has turned to what might be beyond the end of the road for monetary policy.

• Rates strategists look ahead

  In January 2020, KangaNews convened its annual roundtable of Australian major-bank rates strategists to discuss the outlook for the local government-sector bond market. There is a degree of confidence in the outlook for bond performance. Immediate ends to Australia’s sluggish growth profile and dovish rates outlook are less likely.