National accounts: September 2023 quarter

We have developed experimental quarterly estimates for institutional sector accounts, balance sheets, and the nominal income measure of quarterly gross domestic product (GDP), to provide more timely data on New Zealand’s economy. We have published these experimental estimates on a quarterly basis since the first release in March 2021 quarter.

The income measure of gross domestic product (GDPI) and total economy compensation of employees, gross operating surplus and gross mixed income, taxes on production and imports, and subsidies will become official in the December 2023 quarter and will be published in the Gross domestic product: December 2023 quarter information release on 21 March 2024. Income by institutional sector and saving, assets and liabilities measures will remain experimental and continue to be published shortly after the quarterly gross domestic product release.

Key facts

In the September 2023 quarter compared with the June 2023 quarter (in seasonally adjusted terms, except where otherwise stated):

• nominal income GDP increased by 0.9 percent
• nominal expenditure GDP rose by 1.2 percent
• compensation of employees rose by 2.5 percent
• gross operating surplus and gross mixed income fell by 0.5 percent
• household net disposable income rose by 0.5 percent to $59.2 billion
• household saving increased $14 million to $856 million
• household net worth (not seasonally adjusted) ) increased 0.2 percent ($5.3 billion)
• central government net worth (not seasonally adjusted) fell 1.8 percent ($4.8 billion).

Quarterly nominal income GDP, September 2023 quarter

This experimental quarterly nominal income GDP measure provides a timelier measure than the official annual income GDP measure, but we advise caution when comparing it against the official GDP and expenditure on GDP measures.

Nominal income GDP rises

Nominal GDP evaluates gross domestic product at current prices, without adjusting to account for price changes from inflation.

Nominal income GDP rose 0.9 percent in the September 2023 quarter, following a 2.9 percent growth in the June 2023 quarter. The drivers were:

• compensation of employees, up 2.5 percent
• taxes on production and imports, up 0.5 percent
• gross operating surplus and gross mixed income, down 0.5 percent
• subsidies, up 17.8 percent (a rise in subsidies has a downwards contribution to income GDP).

Nominal expenditure GDP rose 1.2 percent in the September 2023 quarter. The main drivers were:

• household final consumption expenditure, up 0.5 percent
• inventories, with stock build up in distribution and manufacturing
• imports of total goods and services, down 1.4 percent (a fall in imports has an upwards contribution to expenditure on GDP).

These rises were partly offset by the falls in:

• exports of total goods and services, down 4.8 percent
• capital investment (gross fixed capital formation), down 2.3 percent.

On an annual basis for the year ended September 2023 compared with the year ended September 2022:

• nominal income GDP increased by 6.9 percent
• nominal expenditure GDP rose 7.3 percent
• compensation of employees rose 8.9 percent
• gross operating surplus and gross mixed income was up 1.7 percent
• taxes on production and imports rose 4.6 percent.

Household saving increases

Household saving shows how much households are saving out of current income (net disposable income). That is, current income less current consumption.

Household saving rose $14 million to $856 million. Household net disposable income increased by $291 million (0.5 percent) to $59.2 billion during the quarter, while household spending rose by 0.5 percent in current price terms to $58.3 billion. The increase in household spending was driven by price increases, as the volume of goods and services consumed by households fell 0.6 percent in the September quarter (Gross domestic product: September 2023 quarter).

The increase in net disposable income was driven by compensation of employees (up $1.0 billion), interest earned by households from their investments (up $340 million), and dividends received (up $266 million). Partly offsetting these increases was a fall in entrepreneurial income (income of self-employed business owners and partnerships), down $247 million or 2.4 percent.

Total income payable rose by $1.2 billion (5.1 percent) to $23.9 billion. This was driven by an increase to interest payable of $246 million and an increase in income tax, up $766 million.

Central government saving increases

Central government saving rose $2.8 billion to $1.6 billion in the September 2023 quarter, from a value of -$1.2 billion in the June 2023 quarter. Total income payable was $14.2 billion (down 5.2 percent), while the income received by the government during the same period was up 6.1 percent to $36.5 billion.

The rise in received income is primarily attributed to income tax received rising by $1.9 billion (10.4 percent) to $20.5 billion, as well as increases to interest and dividends received, up $109 million and $137 million, respectively. These increases were partly offset by a decrease to miscellaneous current transfers received, down $154 million or 30.6 percent.

Meanwhile, the decrease to total income payable was driven by a drop in miscellaneous current transfers payable (down $929 million or 39.5 percent), following a large increase in the June 2023 quarter due to major adverse weather events. This was partly offset by an increase to interest paid of $131 million (8.1 percent), up to $1.7 billion.

Interest increases

Financial business enterprises saw a $1.3 billion (7.4 percent) increase in interest received and a $989 million (6.5 percent) increase in interest paid, in the September 2023 quarter. These movements follow more than two years of quarterly increases, consistent with increases in the official cash rate.

Interest received by households (up $340 million or 8.6 percent) and interest paid by households (up $246 million or 8.2 percent) also grew in the September 2023 quarter. Household interest payments do not include interest paid on rental property mortgages, as rental properties are almost entirely included in the non-financial business enterprises sector. However, interest payments by landlords are indirectly captured in the household sector account as part of entrepreneurial income. Higher interest payments by landlords result in lower entrepreneurial income flows to the household sector.

Quarterly balance sheets

Note: the following quarterly balance sheets series are not seasonally adjusted due to most series not having seasonal behaviour.

Households

Household net worth, the value of all assets owned by households less the value of their liabilities, increased by 0.2 percent ($5.3 billion) to reach $2,293 billion in the September 2023 quarter.

This increase follows a six-quarter period of decline from the March 2022 quarter to the June 2023 quarter. The average decline per quarter in household net worth during this period amounted to $33.6 billion (1.4 percent).

The rise in household net worth was driven by an increase in total assets ($7.6 billion), partly offset by a rise in total liabilities ($2.3 billion).

Household non-financial assets rose $2.3 billion (0.2 percent) from the previous quarter. This is the first rise since the December 2021 quarter. The value of buildings rose $7.0 billion (1.5 percent) while the value of land fell $4.7 billion (0.7 percent). Declines in land values have eased in recent quarters after a peak decline of $49.4 billion in the September 2022 quarter.

Financial assets increased by $5.3 billion (0.4 percent) in the quarter, following a $12.4 billion fall in the June 2023 quarter. The increase in financial assets this quarter was led by rises in currency and deposits, up $4.2 billion, and equity and investment fund shares, up $2.7 billion. The currency and deposits rise (mainly from term deposits) continues with an average value increase of $3.6 billion since the December 2021 quarter.

Household equity includes the value of rental properties less the associated mortgages held against them.

Offsetting the household financial asset increase was a fall in insurance and pensions of $1.6 billion. This is the first fall since the June 2022 quarter which recorded a fall of $7.9 billion.

Household financial liabilities rose $2.3 billion (0.8 percent), mainly due to a rise in household mortgages. Other components of household debt (student loans and consumer loans) were little changed.

Central government institutions

The net worth of the central government institutions sector fell by $4.8 billion (1.8 percent) in the September 2023 quarter. This is the first fall in net worth since the September 2022 quarter when it decreased by $9.8 billion. In the period to the June 2023 quarter, central government net worth grew by $4.5 billion per quarter on average.

The fall in net worth this quarter was due to financial liabilities increasing more than total assets.

Central government liabilities increased $14.8 billion largely due to a $12.3 billion increase in debt securities. Registered banks and non-resident holdings of government securities accounted for most of this increase, with the rest of the world’s holding growing by $3.3 billion over this quarter. Proceeds from the increased issuance explain in part the increased central government deposits at the Reserve Bank.

The quarterly changes in central government debt securities liabilities have a greater fluctuation since the COVID-19 period. Central government debt securities liabilities increased by $12 billion this quarter, in contrast to a fall of $13 billion in the previous quarter.

Central government assets also increased this quarter, up $10.0 billion, but less than liabilities. While both non-financial and financial assets increased in the quarter, total asset growth was mainly driven by increases in currency and deposits, and equity and investment fund shares. Both recorded increases of over $3.0 billion.

More data

Use Infoshare to access national accounts time series.

Subject category: Economic indicators

Group: National accounts – SNA 2008

CSV files for download – the latest data from our information releases.

Definitions and metadata

Quarterly national accounts: (income, saving, assets, and liabilities) – data collection and methodology – DataInfo+ provides the data sources and general methodology used to produce these statistics.

Quarterly national accounts: (income, saving, assets, and liabilities) – concepts – DataInfo+ provides the definitions of terms used in this release.

Quarterly national accounts: (income, saving, assets, and liabilities): September 2023 quarter – changes and data updates – Datainfo+ has details of data updates for this release.

National accounts (income, saving, assets, and liabilities): Sources and methods (fourth edition) describes the data sources and compilation methods used in estimating the quarterly national accounts (income, saving, assets, and liabilities).

About this release

Relationship with gross domestic product

The income measure of gross domestic product (GDPI) and total economy compensation of employees, gross operating surplus and gross mixed income, taxes on production and imports, and subsidies will become official in the December 2023 quarter and will be published with the Gross domestic product: December 2023 quarter release on 21 March 2024. Income by institutional sector and saving, assets, and liabilities measures will remain experimental and continue to be published shortly after the quarterly gross domestic product release.

This release presents a quarterly measure of nominal income GDP, so all three measures of GDP are now compiled and released on a quarterly basis.

The three GDP measures are:

• income GDP and expenditure on GDP in nominal terms
• GDP (the production measure, which is our headline measure of economic activity) in volume terms
• expenditure on GDP in volume terms.

The following should be noted when comparing income GDP against the official production GDP and expenditure on GDP measures:

• While conceptually the three measures should align, in practice different data sources and methods underpin their compilation, which can affect the degree of coherence between them. Notably there is a higher degree of uncertainty around data sources and methods during COVID-19-affected periods. See Overview of sources and methods for quarterly gross domestic product: Updates and COVID-19 adjustments for further information.
• Nominal income GDP is directly linked to the same current price annual benchmarks as expenditure on GDP and as such the profile of these measures are similar for benchmarked periods (currently, up to the March 2022 year).
• Nominal income GDP has a much shorter time series compared with GDP and expenditure on GDP, and this may significantly impact on its seasonal adjustment.

See Gross domestic product: September 2023 quarter for the September 2023 quarter GDP and expenditure on GDP results.

Incorporating data from the annual national accounts

In the September quarter of each year, we reconcile quarterly measures to new annual national accounts data which have been through the process of supply-use balancing. These updates also reflect more accurate data becoming available from the underlying data sources, such as the low-level financial data that becomes available with the annual enterprise survey update.

The availability of more detailed data allows us to understand the level of activity that has occurred over the period and to reflect these in our estimates of quarterly and annual economic growth.

This reconciliation process is essential to maintain the quality of the quarterly series over time by allowing us to include more comprehensive detail previously uncaptured by our quarterly indicators.

National accounts (industry production and investment): Year ended March 2022 provides the annual benchmarks for consolidated accounts up to the year ended March 2022.

National accounts (income and expenditure): Year ended March 2023 provides the benchmarks for most domestic sectors in the institutional sector accounts up to and including the year ended March 2022. The central government sector is benchmarked up to and including the year ended March 2023.

Annual benchmark updates can have a significant effect on quarterly estimates of economic growth. The impact of structural changes and updated data result in updated annual and quarterly series.

Quarterly national accounts: (income, saving, assets, and liabilities): September 2023 quarter – changes and revisions – Datainfo+ has details about the revisions.

Annual balance sheets: 2022 (provisional) published on 11 December 2023 provides the annual benchmarks for all institutional sectors up to March 2022.

Technical enquiries

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Next release

National accounts (income, saving, assets, and liabilities): December 2023 quarter will be released in April 2024.