{"id":617839,"date":"2023-03-14T10:02:56","date_gmt":"2023-03-14T15:02:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.sellorbuyhomefast.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/14\/australia-business-activity-strong-in-feb-even-as-confidence-wanes\/"},"modified":"2023-03-14T10:02:56","modified_gmt":"2023-03-14T15:02:56","slug":"australia-business-activity-strong-in-feb-even-as-confidence-wanes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/14\/australia-business-activity-strong-in-feb-even-as-confidence-wanes\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia business activity strong in Feb, even as confidence wanes"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\"Australia
\n\u00a9 Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A man carries several shopping bags as he walks along George Street in Sydney’s central business district (CBD) Australia, February 5, 2018. Picture taken February 5, 2018. REUTERS\/Daniel Munoz\/File Photo<\/span>
\n<\/i>\n<\/p>\n

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian business conditions remained resilient in February with sales and employment strong, even as confidence took a turn for the worse amid high inflation and rising interest rates.<\/p>\n

The survey from National Australia Bank (OTC:) Ltd (NAB) released on Tuesday showed its index of business conditions dipped one point to +17 in January, still well above its long-run average.<\/p>\n

The volatile measure of confidence fell back to -4, erasing January’s bounce to +6.<\/p>\n

“Overall, the survey confirms the ongoing resilience of the economy through the first months of 2023, though we continue to expect a more material slowdown in demand later in the year when the full effect of rate rises has passed through,” said Alan Oster, NAB’s chief economist.<\/p>\n

The survey paints a mixed picture for the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) which cited the strength of business activity as one reason it hiked interest rates to a decade-high of 3.6% this month.<\/p>\n

Markets had thought another two hikes were likely, until turmoil in the U.S. banking sector radically altered thinking on policy tightening worldwide.<\/p>\n

Now, swaps and futures imply only a minor chance the RBA will lift rates at its April meeting, and suggest it could be done tightening altogether.<\/p>\n

The survey was conducted from Feb. 20 to 28, so it missed the recent chaos in financial markets after Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse.<\/p>\n

Conditions were generally upbeat with the survey’s measure of sales at a very high +27 in February, supported by historically low unemployment and rapid population growth.<\/p>\n

Measures of employment edged up 1 point to +11, while profitability eased a touch to +14.<\/p>\n

The survey’s measure of labour costs ticked up to a quarterly rate of 2.8%, but retail price growth eased to 1.9%. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read More<\/a>
\n Lloyd Michaud<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a9 Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A man carries several shopping bags as he walks along George Street in Sydney’s central business district (CBD) Australia, February 5, 2018. Picture taken February 5, 2018. REUTERS\/Daniel Munoz\/File Photo SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian business conditions remained resilient in February with sales and employment strong, even as confidence took a turn<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":617840,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3065,378],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-617839","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"category-business"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=617839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/617840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=617839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=617839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=617839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}