ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence has slipped down by 0.4pts to 75.8 this week and has now spent fourteen straight weeks below the mark of 80.
It is now the longest stretch below 80 since the index began being conducted on a weekly basis in October 2008. The last time consumer confidence spent at least fourteen weeks under 80 was during the 1990-91 recession when the index was conducted on a monthly basis.
The flatline comes amid the 12th RBA interest rate hike by 0.25% to 4.1%, with Roy Morgan stating the rate is now at its highest in eleven years since being at 4.25% in May 2012.
Consumer confidence is now 11.2pts below the same week a year ago (May 30 – June 5, 2022 at 87.0) and 4pts below the 2023 weekly average of 79.8.
The index was up in Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia, but down in New South Wales and South Australia.
Now 17% of Australians (down 1ppt) say their families are ‘better off’ financially than this time last year compared to 54% (up 1ppt) that say their families are ‘worse off’ financially.
Looking forward, 28% (down 1ppt) expect their family to be ‘better off’ financially this time next year, while 39% (up 4ppts) expect to be ‘worse off’. The latter is the highest figure for this indicator for well over 30 years since August 1989, according to Roy Morgan and ANZ.
Only 5% (down 2ppts) of Australians expect ‘good times’ for the Australian economy over the next twelve months compared to 39% (down 1ppt) who expect ‘bad times’.
Looking further ahead, 13% (up 2ppts) of Australians expect ‘good times’ for the economy over the next five years compared to 21% (unchanged) expecting ‘bad times’.
Sentiment regarding buying intentions has improved slightly this week, Roy Morgan and ANZ report, as Australia enters the Mid-Year and End of Financial Year (EOFY) sales period, with 21% (up 2ppts) of Australians who now say it is a ‘good time to buy’ major household items while 52% (down 2ppts) say now is a ‘bad time to buy’.
ANZ senior economist Adelaide Timbrell said consumer confidence is deeply in negative territory.
“Confidence about future financial conditions fell to its lowest level since the start of the COVID outbreak in late March 2020,” Timbrell said. “Among the housing cohorts, confidence among the outright homeowners fell 4.6pts, while it rose for those paying off their homes (+1pt) and those renting (+3.2).
“While the ‘time to buy a household item’ index remained deeply negative - below 70 for a 17th straight week - it did improve to its best weekly result since February.”