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Data released by the ABS this morning shows that Retail Trade grew, as expected, by 0.5% for the month in December. The final quarter of the year saw a 0.9% increase in volume terms. Both numbers support the contention that the Aussie consumer is slowly becoming less cautious and spending once again.
However, the gains were for the most part restricted to NSW and VIC (up 0.9% and 0.6% respectively) while QLD saw growth of only 0.2% for the month and 0.3% in volume terms for Q4.
In other news this morning the Trade Balance numbers show a sharp move higher in the trade surplus (to $468m) despite expectations of a deficit around $200m. This should translate into a strongly positive net exports contribution to GDP growth in Q4 when we get those numbers on March 5th.
We are proud to have CBC Staff Selection as supporters of the Conus/CBC Staff Selection Trend Employment and Jobseeker data series