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Claire Matthews: Massey University Banking Professor on the Reserve Bank's push to increase cash · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Deserve banks wants retail banks. I should say to go
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: pretty much bananas and bring back the talents. They say,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: cash is still king, people still use it, small businesses
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: need somewhere to deposit it. The demand one thousand extra
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: ATMs or branches across the country, costing the banks one
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: hundred million dollars a year to operate. Claire Matthew's professor
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: at Massi University Business School, with us this morning. Claire,
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Good morning, Mariana. Ryan, so good to have you back. So,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: I mean, this is very expensive for the banks. Do
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  Speaker 1: we actually need that many ATMs and branches?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I'm absolutely not convinced that we do. I think
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  Speaker 2: the cost is a side issue. I think it simply
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: comes down to do we need them? And quite frankly,
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  Speaker 2: I don't understand where the Reserve Bank is coming from
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  Speaker 2: and suggesting that we do.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: What about if there's a natural disaster and everyone needs cash.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: We need to have some circulation going, don't we.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Well, we do need to have, so that part of
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: the argument carry some water. But I think that the
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: solution that they're providing is not the best solution because
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: how often do we have a disaster? And yes, I
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  Speaker 2: know that's happening more often, but they're quite isolated and
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: it's not clear that cash has actually been lacking in
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  Speaker 2: most of those. I think the last time we really
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: had a cash issue was around COVID, and let's hope
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  Speaker 2: we don't have anything like that in the near future.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: I think there is potentially an issue, but I just
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  Speaker 2: don't think the solution is the right solution.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: I was in Hawks Bay for cyclone Gabrielle doing some
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  Speaker 1: reporting there and it was there maybe twelve hours or
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: twenty four hours after it happened. There was no cash.
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  Speaker 1: The ATMs were empty. I mean, it was a problem
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  Speaker 1: is I think there is a genuine argument there. You're
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: saying this is not.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: Necessarily a solution, but you're saying that ATMs were there,
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  Speaker 2: they didn't have cash in them, and I think that
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  Speaker 2: is the problem in a disaster, it's no good. It's
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: no good that there are cash, that there are branches
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: or ATMs. They've got to have cash, and then a disaster,
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: how are you going to get the cash to them?
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  Speaker 2: So I think that that actually illustrates quite clearly where
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  Speaker 2: there why the solution is lacking.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: Yes, but if we had more ATMs, then we would
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  Speaker 1: have more cash, and you know, we would use it more,
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  Speaker 1: we'd be more likely to have it on us, on
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  Speaker 1: our person, that sort of thing.
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  Speaker 2: I don't believe we would because we just don't generally
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: use cash as a population. There are some people that
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: use it a little bit, there are some that use
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: it entirely, but that's a very small fraction of the population.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: For most of us, cash is something that we use
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: because we happen to have it, but it's not what
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  Speaker 2: we want. And for small businesses it's not actually an
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: advantage to them to have cash. Cash is unhygienic, unclean,
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: and a real hassle to deal with, not just because
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: of the hassles around getting it to a branch to bang.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: There's just hassles and having to store it, and there's
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: risk because it opens them up to robbery.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: Clear, appreciate your time this one and Clear Matthews from
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Massive Universe City Time is sixteen after five. Would love
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: to know what you think about that, especially if you're
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: a small business owner. It's unclean.
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: News Talks EDB For more from early edition with Ryan Bridge.
• 3:12
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• 3:16
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