Consumer Sentiment

Westpac’s MI Consumer sentiment for November fell 5.3% in figures released yesterday. This comes as a result of the unexpected cash rate rise from the RBA last Tuesday in conjunction with the publicity of Banks raising their rates well above the cash rate. Housing Finance approvals (Sep) came in at +1.3%, however loan approvals to buy new homes fell, this is a mixed result for the property market, however the drop in new home financing may be a concern for the development sector.

The Peoples Bank of China surprised the market yesterday by announcing they had raised the reserve requirements for the four largest banks by 0.5%. The data released in China had increased the size of its trade surplus for October, placing extra pressure to further reduce the currency devaluation of the Yuan. Property price inflation (China) was down to its lowest point in 10 months, slowing to 8.6% and significantly below the predicted 9.1%. China’s increasing trade surplus could be a real positive for Australia, as growth in this area will continue to push demand for Australia’s mineral exports.

Plenty of data to take in today, with Unemployment for October (+20k jobs and Unemployment to 5% expected) to be released along with a variety of Chinese data, including CPI, PPI, retail sales, industrial production and fixed assets investment. The ECB will also publish it monthly report.