Retail sales to support December quarter GDP

Thursday 5 February 2015

Despite yesterday’s tepid retail sales, which disappointed analyst’s expectations, they are still likely to make a positive contribution to Australia’s December quarter GDP when the national accounts are released early next month.

As reported yesterday, monthly sales values registered 0.2% growth in December on a seasonally-adjusted basis, which was below analyst’s expectations of 0.3% growth. However, in quarterly real chain volume terms, retail sales rose by 1.5%, which was above the September quarter’s 0.9% growth (see next chart).

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About the author

Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.