The Albanese government’s target of building 1.2 million homes over five years depends on constructing large volumes of high-rise apartments in established suburbs. On Tuesday, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) released dwelling approvals data for August, which showed that apartment approvals have collapsed, scuttling the government’s target. In trend terms, only 14,300 dwelling approvals
This week, reports emerged claiming that the Coalition is considering stripping the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority (APRA) of some of its powers to regulate mortgage borrowing and overhauling credit laws to make it easier for first home buyers to borrow for housing. The move comes as the Coalition’s Andrew Bragg is chairing a Senate inquiry into
With Chinese stocks closed for the week there weren’t many catalysts in the region today with local stocks slumping in the wake of poorer than expected retail sales while risk markets overall reacted to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. The USD remained somewhat strong from its overnight little surge but the Australian dollar is holding
With the federal election due by May 2025, all polling suggests that we are headed for a hung parliament. Roy Morgan believes that the result would be “too close to call.” Preferences would determine which party forms government, with the support of minor parties and independents. “If preferences are distributed by what voters tell us
The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) released its half-yearly Financial Stability Review (FSR), which noted that around one-in-20 Australian borrowers have a cashflow shortfall: “In addition to cutting back their spending to mostly essential items and trading down in quality for some goods and services, these households have had to make other difficult adjustments to
Newspoll with the analysis. Labor’s primary vote has fallen to 30 per cent in NSW, marking a historical low with a swing against the Albanese government potentially enough to cost it three to four seats in the largest state alone. An exclusive demographic and state by state Newspoll analysis shows Labor facing a partial rebellion
You won’t see another short squeeze this violent for a very long time. The Market Ear. Beyond parabolic The CSI 300 is up some 27% from recent lows. We have a hard time remembering when an index went from trading way below the 200 day moving average, to way above it. Beyond impressive. Refinitiv 40%
The Albanese government delivered a second consecutive budget surplus, as illustrated below by Justin Fabo at Antipodean Macro: The underlying cash budget balance recorded a surplus of $15.8 billion (0.6% of GDP) in 2023-24, which was larger than forecast in the May Budget. Massive personal tax receipts from the rapidly expanding labour market (read: immigration)
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released retail sales data for August, which jumped by a strong 0.7% over the month to be 3.1% higher year-on-year: The result smashed economists’ expectations of a 0.4% monthly increase. As shown in the table above, the rise was driven by durable goods sales, which increased by 0.8%
These were from yesterday. In its regular meeting today (29 September) chaired by Premier Li Qiang, the State Council focused on the implementation of “launching a basket of incremental easing measures” (“研究部署一揽子增量政策的落实工作”), and reiterated the pledge to “strive for the full-year growth targets”, echoing President Xi’s call in the SeptemberPolitburo meeting. Specifically, Premier Li pledged