I don’t publish it often but today is noteworthy as the ANZ weekly consumer confidence number tanked 3.4% to 114 continuing its downwards trend. From ANZ:
Consumer confidence took a beating last week, most likely on the back of the RBA’s downgrade to its economic outlook.
The fall reversed all the gains and then some since the weak reading seen at the start of this year. Weak retail sales and building approvals data may also have negatively impacted sentiment.
…Confidence still remains above the long-run average, however, as does the key current financial conditions sub-index,” he says.
So we aren’t giving up on the consumer just yet.
There was plenty to be bearish about with poor data flow, Hayne Royal Commission shock and the RBA capitulation.
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal.
He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.
