Weekly Update: 10.06.22

“The Board is committed to doing what is necessary to ensure that inflation in Australia returns to target over time.”

–    RBA Governor Philip Lowe

---

Parliamentary Update:

• Treasurer Dr Jim Chalmers provided an address to Sky News and The Australian’s Economic Outlook Business Luncheon on Wednesday. He outlined upcoming meetings with AEMO, the RBA Governor Philip Lowe and the NZ Finance Minister.
• Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services Stephen Jones confirmed that buy now, pay later products will be regulated as credit products by mid-2023.
• Treasury Secretary Dr Steven Kennedy delivered a post Budget briefing on the economy. Unemployment is expected to decline to 3.75% and stabilise until 2024-25, with expected inflationary wage pressures. Debt to GDP is expected to decline to 26.4% in the medium term (from a peak of 31.6% in 20-21).
• The 47^th Parliament will be opened on 26 July. The Treasurer will deliver a Budget on Tuesday 25 October.
• The NSW and QLD State Budgets will both be delivered on Tuesday 21 June.

---

Economic Update:

• The RBA raised the cash rate target by 50 basis points to 85. The board expects “inflation to increase further this year, then decline back towards the 2-3% range next year”.
• The ABS released Payroll statistics. Total wages were down 1.8% for the month till 14 May, but up 6.7% for the year. The number of industrial disputes halved from the previous quarter – 55 down to 30.
• COSBOA has released a Small Business Power Research Report. A third of SME’s reported they experienced energy hardship.1 in 5 small businesses report they use their personal credit card to pay energy bills. Survey results were from February 2022.
• The World Bank released its Global Economic Prospects report highlighting the spectre of global stagflation: “The danger of stagflation is considerable today. Between 2021 and 2024, global growth is projected to have slowed by 2.7 percentage points—more than twice the deceleration between 1976 and 1979.”
• The RBA released its chart pack for data to June 2022: business investment dropping to 1992 levels, commodity prices at record highs.

---

Communications:

The ABA officially launched its Agribusiness Report 2022 this week with media stories across radio, TV, print and online.

View online