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The health of corporate New Zealand will be on full display for all to see next week with a brace of our top companies reporting full year earnings results.
Amongst those to report are Fletcher Building, Freightways, Contact, Sky City and Telecom.
Hopefully the reasonable shape of the economy in the first half of the year should at least see most meet market expectations.
It's crucial for the economy that they do.
The slew of bad global and local economic data that has come in over the last few weeks has dented business confidence and there can be little doubt now that economic activity is starting to slow in New Zealand.
Given that weakening in activity, the commentary and outlooks delivered by company CEOs for the next six months or so will be of extra importance next week.
Analysts will be picking over the commentary for any hint of weakness or slowing growth.
Of course for those chief executives, actually giving realistic guidance for the next year may well prove very difficult, even near impossible.
Remember we are in a period that even Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke believes is unusually uncertain.
Who can really say for sure where the economy will be in six months time? Let alone six weeks.
The value of guidance
For the likes of our largest listed company Fletcher Building, guidance is of course always important.
In recent years the company has talked of a big backlog of largely government infrastructure projects, like the redevelopment of Eden Park, that have helped to offset weaker demand in the residential sector.
As yet there is still little sign of residential building bouncing back... so it's likely that reliance on government projects will need to continue for a while longer yet.
It will therefore be interesting to see what Fletchers has to say about the health of its order book this year.
The government isn't of course likely in this climate to suddenly rein in infrastructure spending, so one would imagine there will still be plenty of construction work up for grabs.
But we shouldn't expect it to necessarily ramp up spending either to help boost the flagging economy.
In a speech yesterday, Finance Minister Bill English stressed the government would need to have the books back in the black before it could increase spending. That could be five years away.
That means the heavy lifting will again fall on the Reserve Bank when it comes to propping up the economy over the next few months.
It's now under huge pressure to pause on an interest rate hike in September, with some economists even suggesting that there should be no more increases until next year.
Still at least New Zealand's central bank has some bullets left in the gun to fire if need be.
With interest rates basically at zero in the US they have few options left with which to keep their economy afloat.
This week the US Fed reiterated it would keep interest rates near zero and also look to start purchasing government bonds again (ie printing money) in a bid to help keep interest rates down over the longer term.
The move was a double edged sword for many.
Because while the move could help to ward off a double dip recession in the medium term, it also acts as a stark reality check for just how bad things have got in the last few weeks.
The Fed did not want to have to start printing money again and would only have decided to do so if the outlook was genuinely gloomy.
But then what choice did it have? As in New Zealand and other Western nations, governments have exhausted their balance sheets and seem in most cases reluctant to go back down the path of increased stimulus.
That's why next week's results will be so closely watched.
