Consumer confidence: soft start to the year

• ANZ-Roy Morgan Australian Consumer confidence has started 2019 with a fall of 2.2%.
• Current financial conditions fell by 4.3%, the third consecutive fall, while future financial conditions bucked the overall trend and rose 1.1%.
• Economic conditions declined, with current and future economic conditions falling by 4.2% and 3.1% respectively.
• The ‘time to buy a household item’ fell 1.1%. Four-week moving average inflation expectations were stable at 4.3%.

{CF_IMAGE}

ANZ’s Head of Australian Economics, David Plank, commented:

“Consumer confidence has started 2019 on a soft note, with overall sentiment falling by 2.2%. A number of factors are likely at play. Much of the global news has been negative over recent weeks, with broad weakness in equity prices since the last confidence survey in December reflective of this. More recently the Chinese PMI fell below 50 for the first time in 19 months and the stand-off between the US Congress and the President has intensified. On the domestic front sentiment has likely been affected by the media’s focus on falling house prices. The cricket may not be helping either! On the positive side, lower petrol prices will be helping sentiment and the strong US payrolls report shows there is still plenty of momentum in the US economy. And we should keep in mind that consumer confidence remains above average.”

Download the report

{CF_IMAGE}