Weekly Australian consumer confidence index, for the week ended February 21

  • Up 0.6% on the week

Explanation from ANZ:

  • Diminishing impact of the January financial market volatility
  • Current personal finance & near-term economic outlook sentiment have improved

ANZ chief economist Warren Hogan warns to beware of tax policy debate impact in coming surveys:

  • "Discussions around tax reform and spending cuts are likely to intensify ahead of the May Commonwealth Budget and could weigh on sentiment in the coming months
  • The impetus from the strength in the labour market may dissipate if employment growth slows around the middle of the year as we expect
  • This will be important for the outlook for monetary policy with the RBA looking for consumption growth to return to above trend later this year"

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On the other hand, footy season is just around the corner, that'll give sentiment a boost. (Oh, that's not ANZ's opinion, just me)