ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence falls 1.8pts to a neutral result of 100.0 with positive and negative sentiment now evenly balanced

Current financial conditions

• Now 26% (unchanged) of Australians say their families are ‘better off’ financially than this time last year while slightly more, 29% (up 3ppts), say their families are ‘worse off’ financially.

Future financial conditions

• Just over a third, 34% (down 3ppts) of Australians expect their family to be ‘better off’ financially this time next year, compared to only 16% (up 2ppts) that expect to be ‘worse off’ financially.

Current economic conditions

• However, only 11% (down 1ppt) of Australians expect ‘good times’ for the Australian economy over the next twelve months while 28% (down 1ppt), expect ‘bad times’.

Future economic conditions

• In the longer term, a fifth of Australians, 20% (up 2ppts), are expecting ‘good times’ for the economy over the next five years compared to 17% (unchanged) expecting ‘bad times’.

Time to buy a major household item

• Buying intentions were slightly weaker this week with a third, 33% (down 2ppts) of Australians, saying now is a ‘good time to buy’ major household items while just over a third, 34% (up 1ppt) say now is a ‘bad time to buy’.

"Consumer confidence declined 1.8% last week despite rising vaccination rates and reasonably good economic news in the form of the 0.7% rise in Q2 GDP. Sentiment dropped in Sydney (-5.3%), Melbourne (-0.8%) and Brisbane (-2.9%), while Adelaide (+5.0%) and Perth (+2.3%) lifted. The most notable thing in this week’s release is the jump in inflation expectations to its highest level in almost three years. The weekly reading can be volatile so we need to be a bit cautious about overplaying the move, but if sustained it will cement the sharpest jump in inflation expectations since we moved to collecting the data on a weekly basis."