ABS Business Indicators are out this morning and show an economy in the doldrums in the December quarter+
DECEMBER KEY FIGURES
 | | |
Sep Qtr 11 to Dec Qtr 11 |
Dec Qtr 10 to Dec Qtr 11 |
| | |
% |
% |
|
| ||||
| Sales of goods and services (Chain volume measures) | | | ||
| Manufacturing | | | |
| | Trend |
0.7 |
1.6 |
| | Seasonally Adjusted |
-0.2 |
0.9 |
| Wholesale trade | | | |
| | Trend |
1.9 |
6.5 |
| | Seasonally Adjusted |
2.0 |
6.9 |
| Inventories (Chain volume measures) | | | ||
| Trend |
0.6 |
2.2 | |
| Seasonally Adjusted |
1.4 |
2.4 | |
| Company gross operating profits | | | ||
| Trend |
-0.1 |
5.3 | |
| Seasonally Adjusted |
-6.5 |
2.2 | |
| Wages and salaries | | | ||
| Seasonally Adjusted |
0.8 |
6.9 | |
So, profits took a beating, salaries climbed and so did inventories. That looks about all square for tomrrow’s GDP release, though it’s a notoriously difficult measure to forecast. I’m wondering, though, about the inventory build, which is very strong. It’s either the result of weaker than expected demand, or an expected bounce in demand perhaps on the November and December rate cuts. Given the nasty profit result, you’d have to put your money on the former. Either way, it doesn’t bode well for March QTR GDP.
Anyways, here are a couple of charts on sectoral profit performance. Mining is down, I imagine on the terms of trade correction:
And here are the other major sectors:
That’s pretty patchy all around on the quarter
