"Our objective is to encourage banks to continue to fund their corporate clients by purchasing their debt securities, given the confidence that these securities can be funded by exchanging them with us for cash," assistant governor Christian Hawkesby said.
Kiwibank chief economist Jarrod Kerr said the market had plenty of liquidity at the moment, with about $21 billion cash in the system compared with about $7b normally but that could change in future.
"It's basically telling the market, here's another facility banks can get cash from us, should they need it. We don't need it today," but who knows what conditions will be further down the track, Kerr said.
Kiwibank dealer Mike Shirley said Mondays were typically light on volume until the major markets opened.
"We're one of the first markets to open – the world is going to take its cues from US markets."
Between the latest news on the coronavirus, the signing of America's US$2.2 trillion ($3.6t) rescue package on Saturday, accounting for about 10 per cent of that nation's GDP, and plummeting oil prices, the major markets will have plenty to trade on when they reopen after the weekend, Shirley said.
West Texas Intermediate crude oil is trading at US$20.39 a barrel from a high of almost US$62 in December.
The number of coronavirus infections worldwide reached 722,196 today, with the US accounting for 142,178 of them, up from 85,594 on Friday. New Zealand's cases jumped by 76 to 589 today and the first local death was recorded on Sunday.
The New Zealand dollar was trading at 98.08 Australian cents from 98.04 cents at 5pm on Friday. It was at 48.64 British pence from 48.77, at 54.35 euro cents from 54.08, at 64.62 yen from 65 and at 4.2730 Chinese yuan from 4.2272.
The bid price on the two-year swap rate closed at 0.5050 per cent from 0.5300 on Friday, while 10-year swaps were at 0.8800 per cent from 0.9570 per cent.
