Yesterday one of our more bullish commenters (BK) asked us what we thought of yesterday’s car sales. It’s not usually something we track but it probably should be so thanks for the question and here it is. First from the ABS:
I always work in seasonally adjusted figures (unlike DE). The overall result here looks pretty good. But most of the strength is coming from NSW, which had a nice pop. And Queensland, which the ABS itself ascribes to a post-flood bounce on damage replacement.
Overall then, a good month nationally with 3.4% growth from February. Here’s the history of sales:
Ignore the dates, they’re wrong (am sick in bed so don’t care). You can see the pop in the last column. But it’ll take a few months more to convince me of a break in the downtrend you see over the past year.
Let’s all put our hands together and pray that sales don’t accelerate. If they do, the rate rise will come bumper to bumper.
