Household wealth takes a hit

The ABS yesterday released its Australian National Accounts: Finance and Wealth survey for the March quarter, which revealed that households took a 1.8% hit to their net worth driven by due to a $333.6 billion decrease in financial assets, driven by superannuation reserves (-$268.2 billion) and shares and other equity (-$57.6 billion):

Household wealth per capita decreased $9,982 (2.3%) to $428,585, the largest fall since September quarter 2011.

The household debt to assets ratio increased from 19.1 to 19.6, as the fall in household assets (-1.4%) outweighed the rise in household debt (0.8%).

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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.