Australia & New Zealand Economics Focus What next for house prices? The recent fall in the demand for housing relative to the supply is consistent with house prices continuing to decline in the coming months. While prices may only edge lower this year and next, higher... 10th April 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Update Funding spike won’t push up mortgage rates much The recent rise in banks’ short-term funding costs would probably need to triple before banks could justify raising their mortgage rates by 0.25%, which would be equivalent to a hike in the official... 9th April 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Weekly Household spending to lose momentum There have been some encouraging data on the health of consumer spending in Australia recently, and with the labour market remaining strong and consumer confidence relatively high there are certainly... 6th April 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Data Response Australia International Trade (Feb.) As Australia is more exposed than most other advanced economies to a further escalation of trade tensions between the US and China, the fall in its international trade surplus in February is... 5th April 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Data Response Retail Sales & Building Approvals (Feb.) While February’s retail sales and building approvals data sent mixed signals on the health of the overall economy, it is most likely that both consumption and dwellings investment will be weaker than... 4th April 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Update Global events may keep the RBA on hold for longer The Reserve Bank of Australia has become more worried about trade tariffs and rising global bank funding costs. Coming on top of the weakness of the housing market and wage growth, it is becoming even... 3rd April 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Weekly Corporate tax cuts wouldn’t boost the economy much The Australian government’s plan to cut the corporate tax rate from 30% to 25% by 2026/27 wouldn’t be a boon for the economy for two reasons. First, the tax rate would need to be cut much further to... 29th March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Chart Pack Bounce back in activity unlikely Both the Australian and New Zealand economies failed to regain any momentum at the end of 2017 with GDP rising by a slower than expected 0.6% q/q in New Zealand and just 0.4% q/q in Australia... 28th March 2018 · 1 min read
RBA Watch What could prompt a rate rise in 2018? The Reserve Bank of Australia will almost certainly leave interest rates on hold at 1.5% at its policy meeting on Tuesday 3rd April and it’s likely to reiterate that rate hikes remain some way off by... 27th March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Weekly Record run of job growth won’t be sustained Following a surprisingly strong 2017, the Australian labour market has started 2018 on a firm footing and business surveys suggest that employment growth will continue to climb in the coming months... 23rd March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Data Response Australia Labour Market (Feb.) Australia does not have a problem creating jobs, as employment continued to grow at its fastest rate in a decade in February. But there is still a lot of slack in the market that will need to be used... 22nd March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Update Fed leapfrogs the RBA and RBNZ We believe the probable rise in US rates on Wednesday will mark the start of the first prolonged period since the late 1990s where interest rates in America are higher than in Australia and New... 21st March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Update Further falls in dwellings investment lie ahead While the recent rises in building approvals are encouraging, we doubt they are a sign that the drag on GDP growth from dwellings investment is already over. Indeed, we expect that dwellings... 20th March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Data Response Australia ABS House Prices (Q4) The 1.0% q/q rise in ABS house prices in the fourth quarter overstates the health of the market at the end of last year and the more up-to-date CoreLogic data show that prices stagnated in the first... 20th March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Weekly An escalation of trade tariffs poses a big threat You could argue that an escalation of global trade tariffs could actually benefit Australia and New Zealand in the near-term if it caused their currencies to weaken and led China to stimulate its own... 16th March 2018 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Data Response Australia Consumer Confidence (Mar.) While the modest rise in the Westpac measure of consumer confidence in March was a welcome sight following January’s weaker than expected retail sales figures, we remain cautious about the outlook for... 14th March 2018 · 1 min read
