On the asset side, on average non-financial assets account for a significantly greater share than in the US (Figure 6). They consist mainly of primary residences (Figure 7), although additional properties are also quantitatively significant in Finland, Germany, Portugal and Spain, where they account for roughly 20 per cent of households’ total assets.
The Reserve Bank was initially very tolerant with the relatively high rates of expansion in the financial aggregates, particularly with a continuous decline in the rate of inflation, which came down from 14 per cent in 1992 to 7½ per cent in 1996.