Kiwis’ financial wellbeing improves since first covid lockdown

Auckland - New Zealanders’ financial wellbeing has improved eight percent on average since the first covid pandemic lockdown last year, largely driven by reduced spending.

One year on from lockdown, new research from the ASB bank underscores the financial impact of the covid pandemic on Kiwis.

But New Zealanders are still doing it tough with more than a third of Kiwis living pay-day to pay-day and nearly half have less than $1000 in savings.

An ASB financial wellbeing study which began before the first covid 19 lockdown shows Kiwis have weathered the storm, ending up on average financially better off than they were this time last year.

ASB collaborated with an Australian, not a New Zealand university, to develop a measure that gives insight into Kiwis’ financial wellbeing, using data across more than half a million ASB personal banking customers.

The study  looked into how New Zealanders fared during one of the most extraordinary years in the nation’s economic and social history.

The percentage of Kiwis living from one pay-day to the next reduced in the year to February 2021, with six percent of ASB customers able to build up enough savings over the year to change this pattern.

The ASB study also found that more than a third of customers frequently had balances of less than their average weekly expenses, and 15 percent of customers always spend more than 80 percent of their income.