The Reserve Bank left the OCR at 5.5 percent during today's review, in line with predictions.

The Bank also issued a hawkish statement about future hikes, claiming further hikes would be needed if inflationary pressures got to be stronger than anticipated.

Infometrics chief economist Gareth Kiernan says there's a good chance the OCR will need to go up between now and 2025.

"Economic activity is running a percentage point higher than the Reserve Bank had been anticipating when it did its' last statement back in August- that didn't sound like a lot, but we knew the economy was highly stretched."

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