Australian Economy

Josh Recessionberg favourite index.

Executive chairman of Harvey Norman, Gerry Harvey, has warned that Australia’s retail recession will deepen with more store closures on the way: Speaking after the release of Harvey Norman’s latest results, Harvey told news.com.au there are more retail collapses on the way, and they will likely include smaller businesses.

Monday’s December quarter Business Indicators release from the ABS, which feeds into today’s national accounts, showed that the gap between wages & salaries has narrowed against business profits.

The virus is going to pass and the climb towards full employment resume.

Via The Conversation: The COVID-19 coronavirus is spreading across the world.

New automotive data from Roy Morgan shows significant changes to who is likely to be behind the wheel in Australia.

The miracle current surplus Australia has enjoyed for two quarter all but disappeared in Dec 19 as iron ore and, especilly, coal got thumped: It’s still rising on an annual basis: Net foreign debt fell slightly: I wouldn’t give up hope yet on more CAS.

Via Domain: An international student living in Brisbane has become the seventh person to test positive for coronavirus in Queensland.

Via the excellent Damien Boey at Credit Suisse: We now have all the partial indicators we can get our hands on to now-cast 4Q real GDP, covering between 52-90% of GDP.

Alan Kohler is the latest commentator that has attempted to solve the puzzle as to why Australia’s productivity has slumped: The Productivity Commission’s annual “Insights” publication, which stated that both labour and multifactor productivity fell for the first time since the mining boom, by 0.2 per cent and 0.4 per cent respectively.

Via ANZ: ANZ’s survey of consumer confidence dived 3.2 per cent last week, to a five-and-a-half year low as coronavirus concerns spread across the world.

Never waste a good crisis.

The December quarter Business Indicators report was released by the ABS, which includes aggregate wages & salaries data, namely “gross earnings before taxation and other deductions” and “includes provisions for employee entitlements”.

Yep, at the AFR: Australia’s economy stands on the front line of the worsening global coronavirus outbreak and faces recession if China doesn’t start to recover this month, says Donald Trump’s former top economics adviser.

February’s ANZ job ads have been released which reported the second consecutive rise, up 0.7% in February and almost 5% over the past two months: However, job ads were down 10.2% year-on-year.

Via the ABS comes mixed GDP partials: Inventories beat analysts expectations of -0.1% and will add to GDP after falling by 0.2% seasonally adjusted in Q3.

The former secretary of the Australian Treasury, Ken Henry, believes Australian households are struggling, wedged between rising housing costs, insecure work arrangements, and low wage growth: I’m no longer so comfortable with the increasing ‘casualisation’ of the labour market .

It’s not a very good idea to import a bunch of Europeans and put them at the centre of a screaming crowd for a week.

From the AIG: You ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.

Via Martin North come his new virus scenarios for property: The video Q&A: My base case is now a global pandemic based around winter periods.

The Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) new car sales report for January was a sobering read for dealerships around Australia.

Ishka CEO Toby Darvall says “a perfect storm” of conditions has made things incredibly tough for Australian retailers.

Telstra this week announced that it will no longer sell 100mbps plans to consumers with fibre to the kerb and fibre to the node connections to the NBN.