The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) released Financial Aggregates data for October today:
Total credit provided to the private sector by financial intermediaries rose by 0.2 per cent over October 2011, after rising by 0.5 per cent over September. Over the year to October, total credit rose by 3.5 per cent.
Housing credit increased by 0.4 per cent over October, following an increase of 0.5 per cent over September. Over the year to October, housing credit rose by 5.7 per cent.
Other personal credit declined by 0.3 per cent over October, after rising by 0.2 per cent over September. Over the year to October, other personal credit decreased by 1.4 per cent.
Business credit was flat in October, after rising by 0.6 per cent over September. Over the year to October, business credit increased by 0.7 per cent.
Over the month of October, M3 grew by 0.4 per cent and broad money grew by 0.5 per cent. Over the year to October, broad money grew by 8.2 per cent.
By category, the growth in aggregate credit looks like the following:
Notably, business lending has tapered and is still well off its peak as businesses have paid down debt, whilst personal credit continues to deleverage:
Onto housing and you can plainly see the divergence in total investor housing credit growth and owner occupier credit growth:
And the change in growth rates on a monthly basis is an obvious downtrend for owner occupier credit, and is reverting to 2009 rates for investors:
In total, housing credit monthly growth figures are still positive, but decelerating (I’ve added a 12 month moving average in black below):
On a long term, annualised basis, the picture is obvious – housing credit is completely different now to the last 30 years.
