Australian consumer sentiment rises in January on strong employment

Australian consumer sentiment rose at the beginning of 2018. The headline ANZ-Roz Morgan Australian consumer sentiment index rose 4.7 percent from mid-December to 122, the highest since November 2013. The sub components also indicated considerable rises.

Consumers continued to be positive about financial conditions, which also increased to the highest since early 2017. Both current and future financial conditions recorded rises, gaining 5.8 percent and 4.2 percent from last reported respectively.

Current economic conditions were up 5.2 percent from the last reported to 113.7, the highest since September 2013, whereas the future economic conditions were up 4.2 percent to 115.2. Confidence around the ‘time to buy a household item’ countered the 1.2 percent decline in December to rise by 4.4 percent. Inflation expectations continued to be stable at 4.5 percent in four week moving average terms in spite of higher petrol prices.

According to the ANZ head of Australian economics, David Plank, continued strength in the labor market and a solid performance in the Ashes series probably helped sustained the cheer among consumers.

“It needs to be acknowledged that consumer confidence usually rises in the first reading for January. Still, the increase this year is stronger than the 3.6% average lift in confidence for the past nine ‘annual turns’, indicating that the gain in confidence is more than just seasonal”, added David Plank.

At 14:00 GMT the FxWirePro's Hourly Strength Index of Australian Dollar was highly bearish at -126.146, while the FxWirePro's Hourly Strength Index of US Dollar was slightly bullish at 67.8586. For more details on FxWirePro's Currency Strength Index, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex

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