Roy Morgan has released its weekly consumer confidence and confirming today’s lousy October retail sales number, the post June confidence pulse is just about exhausted:
Consumer Confidence fell to 109.7pts (down 3.4pts in a week), according to the Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence Rating conducted last weekend (November 26/27, 2011). Consumer Confidence is now 10.9pts lower than a year ago, November 27/28, 2010 (120.6).
This week’s fall in Consumer Confidence has been driven by Australians having less confidence in the Australian economy over the next twelve months and over the next five years.
Australians are far less optimistic about Australia’s economy over the next twelve months with 28% (down 6%) of Australians expecting Australia to have ‘good times’ economically (the lowest since August 13/14, 2011) compared to 37% (up 4%) that expect ‘bad times’ economically.
Australians are also less optimistic about the longer-term with 34% (down 4%) of Australians expecting Australia to have ‘good times’ economically over the next five years compared to 24% (up 3%) that expect ‘bad times’ the highest since July 30/31, 2011
Australians are less confident about their family’s financial situation compared to a year ago with 29% (down 2%) of Australians saying their family is ‘better off’ financially compared to 33% (up 1%) that say their family is ‘worse off’ financially.
Australians’ assessment of their personal financial situations this time next year is unchanged with 35% (unchanged) saying they expect their family to be ‘better off’ financially and 23% (unchanged) expecting to be ‘worse off’.
Despite falls in other components an increasing majority of Australians 59% (up 3%) say now is a ‘good time to buy’ major household items compared to 20% (unchanged) that say now is a ‘bad time to buy’.
I am still undecided about what the RBA will do next week and will write on it in the next day or so, but if it were up to me, it would be another cut.
