Few changes are expected from the Reserve Bank's monetary policy statement this week, but ongoing troublesome business confidence surveys could yet undermine recent economic positives.
Economists are becoming concerned the repeated negative outlook coming from surveys will translate into actual headwinds for the economy.
Westpac chief economist Dominick Stephens said he expected the Reserve Bank to reiterate the main point of its September official cash rate review, to keep the OCR at 1.75% through 2019 and into 2020, but that the OCR's next move "could be up or down''.
The Reserve Bank's interest-driving OCR is at a record low of 1.75% and most analysts expect it to remain unchanged until 2020.
ASB chief economist Nick Tuffley said the Reserve Bank was likely to remain cautious and to reiterate its neutral bias, also that the next OCR move might be up or down.
He expects the Reserve Bank to sound just as cautious in Thursday's announcement as it was in September, if not a little more.
The key determinant of any shift in the Reserve Bank's stance will be how circumspect it has become on growth for the second half of 2018 and the first half of 2019, despite "banking'' considerably stronger than expected second quarter growth.
"Business confidence remains weak, and the risk that soft confidence translates into weaker activity is very real,'' Mr Tuffley said.
Mr Stephens said that in recent months New Zealand's economic and inflation data had "headed north'', and was clearly stronger than the Reserve Bank's forecasts.
June quarter gross domestic product (GDP) was well ahead of the Reserve Bank's expectation, September inflation was 0.9% compared with the central bank's forecast of 0.4%, and the exchange rate was lower than it had expected.
"Most second-tier data, such as electronic card transactions and building consents, have been strong.
"And fixed mortgage rates have fallen sharply, which will be a source of stimulus for house prices,'' Mr Stephens said.
Mr Tuffley said weaker economic data could come if there were more, sharp increases in petrol prices, which were putting pressure on household budgets.
Rising global risks suggested more negative risks to New Zealand's growth and inflation outlook, he said.
Mr Stephens noted that while recent economic data may have been strong, business confidence was "desperately low'', and now consumer confidence had also fallen.
"There's a risk that could portend a weakening of the domestic economy,'' he said.
Global risks included the recent declines in US share prices over the past weeks, emerging market volatility and the escalating trade war between the US and China.
"And the Reserve Bank will be cautious about recent signs that core inflation is rising, given that inflation was so low for so long,'' Mr Stephens said.
He expected the Reserve Bank to stick to "the same broad monetary policy outlook'', including restating the all-important phrase that the next move in the OCR could be "up or down''.
He said the Reserve Bank would probably state it had upgraded its inflation forecast, partly due to the rising petrol prices.
However, the Reserve Bank might also acknowledge core inflation had been a little stronger than anticipated, and would make it clear that signs of rising inflation were welcome, he said.
