Domestic tourism provides solid boost to the Far North

The release this morning by Tourism Research Australia of the National and International Visitor Surveys for the Sept 2019 quarter (available here) will have provided some light relief for the tourism industry in our region; although the good news was restricted to the domestic sector. Across Australia total domestic visitor …read more

Slowing Chinese visitor growth sees short term visitor expansion at 7-year low

The ABS release of short term visitor data today for Nov 2019 shows that, as the number of visitors from China slows (or goes into decline) we are seeing total short term visitors numbers over the past 12 months slow to a rate not seen sice August 2012. Seasonally adjusted …read more

Greater Brisbane showing most of the improvment in building approvals

As we noted last week (see here), the decline in building approvals appears to have at least slowed. Today sees the release of the original ABS regional approvals data which allows us to update our Conus Trend series. This shows that the bulk of the ‘improvement’, in the form of …read more

Trend Jobseekers continue to fall despite rises in unemployed

The Dept of Social Services original Jobseekers data for November, released today, allows us to update our Conus/CBC Staff Selection Trend Jobseeker series for Cairns and Townsville. It shows that, while the number unemployed has lifted in recent months, the Trend number of people claiming Youth and Newstart Allowances has …read more

What are the ‘hidden dangers’ of Trad’s plan to use super fund surplus?

A story in today’s Australian talks about the ‘hidden dangers’ seen in the Queensland Treasurer’s plan to utilise $5bn of the public service Defined Benefit superannaution fund surplus to set up a Queensland Future Fund to pay down the state’s debt in the future ($3bn is a new withdrawl while …read more

Building Approvals declines slow

The ABS release of residential building approvals for November confirms the slide continues; although the rate of that decline has certainly slowed. Seasonally adjusted data for Australia shows approvals were up 11.8% m/m and remain just 3.8% lower than a year ago, which is the best result since the middle …read more

Regional jobs data highlights ongoing concerns about youth employment in the regions

The ABS this morning released their original regional labour force data which allowed us to update our Conus/CBC Staff Selection Regional Employment Trend data series. The Trend series shows us that Greater Brisbane has seen reasonable Trend employment growth for the year (+39,500) at a rate of 3.2% pa, far …read more

Jobs data provides a little Xmas cheer

The November labour force data from the ABS will have provided just a touch of Xmas cheer in Canberra, Brisbane and Martin Place. The headline, seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dipped to 5.2% (from 5.3%) while employment lifted 39,900 (much better than the anticipated +15,000), although we should note that Oct’s …read more

Short term arrivals and departures data points to further under-performance in QLD

As ABS Oct data shows Chinese visitations continuing to grow (+4.5% y/y) leading total short term arrivals higher (+3.1%), the State of Intended Stay data, when seen through the lens of the Conus Trend, shows Queensland (once again) underperforming against most other states. With total Trend short term visitations up …read more

Labour Account highlights the weakness in Regional QLD income growth

Today’s release of the Sept 2019 Labour Account data series provides a wealth of information. One thing it allows us to do is take a  look at incomes across various industry sectors and how they have changed in the past 12 months. The table below shows, for selected industries, the year-on-year changes …read more

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