It looks as though New Zealand is headed towards an unexpected recession. While house prices are expected to drop in the near term, economist Tony Alexander points out six factors to think about in the current market.

The Financial Markets Authority says it is “closely monitoring” the impact of coronavirus on New Zealand’s financial market and is considering all its options to ensure that markets continue to function well.

Fidelity Life has taken the same decision as Partners Life and has stopped selling redundancy cover.

Partners Life is making major changes to its commission payments which will see payments made to FAPs based on customer outcomes rather than to dealer groups.

Kiwibank is the second bank to slash fixed rates after the Reserve Bank's OCR cut, dropping its one year to 3.09%.

Newpark has appointed an acting general manager following the sudden departure of Melanie Purdey.

International planning group de Vere, which has five advisers in Auckland, has launched a contactless advice service.

Financial Advice New Zealand has postponed its annual conference.

Advisers say they are dealing with only a small number of inquiries about coronavirus-related market disruption – but that may be because of the work already put in on educating clients.

A review of the Insurance Act is being pushed back because of the outbreak of coronavirus.

ANZ has slashed its fixed rate mortgages, launching the lowest ever one year rate offered by a major bank.

Property prices will fall for the next six months, with house price inflation slowing to 0% by next March, according to ASB economists.

Most borrowers are yet to benefit from the Reserve Bank's OCR cut, but banks say they are weighing up cuts to fixed rate mortgages.