“Each individual should be able to make good decisions without peer pressure.”
- Ana Monnar
Key Points
- RBA surprising 0.50% increase
- Housing market continues to cool off
- Australian Farmers going from strength to strength
- Amazing admission by US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen
- OPEC+ agreed on increased oil supply
Australia
The RBA finally made their move and continue to play catch up with the market. Dr. Lowe surprised economists (most of them anticipated a rise between 25 to 40bps) when they increased the cash rate from 0.35 per cent to 0.85 per cent. This was the largest increase in 22 years and indicated inflation would peak higher than the 6 per cent forecast in May. On the back of that, we have responded immediately and raised our cash rate to 1.25%.
Governor Philip Lowe commented ‘While inflation is lower than in most other advanced economies, it is higher than earlier expected,’ Dr Lowe is citing supply chain disruptions and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine amongst some of the main contributors (also one questions what higher interest rates will do to ease these pressures!). However, this move by the RBA still leaves them behind of what the bond market is already anticipating, and an excellent example of this is that the all-important 3month BBSW is already now trading at 1.25%.
The property bubble, not surprisingly, is slowly deflating and Sydney’s auction clearance rates continued to drop at recently stood at only 59%. Apparently more than two in five homes failed to sell at auctions last week as buyers stayed on the sidelines. Vendors of course are also feeling nervous with many auctions cancelled or withdrawn and more than half of homes are sold before auctions. This price adjustment was way overdue and welcome news for the RBA and which will also dampen the all-important consumer confidence.
In some good news for our export sector, The Australian Banking Association recently stated in a new report from their member banks that they experience strong lending to the agribusinesses with an almost 30% increase over the previous year. ‘This data tells us there’s both a high degree of optimism and confidence in the sector, despite a long period of savage drought,’ the Associations director, Ms Bligh said. In some further good news recently, there were some reports that increased planting by Victorian and Queensland grain farmers has set Australia up for a third consecutive bumper harvest which combined with the elevated prices on the back of a global supply crunch should provide another financial boost to the agriculture sector.
Global
Globally, everyone is still trying to absorb the amazing confession by Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen (former Chair of the Fed!) that she did not fully understand when she said last year that the inflation the economy was seeing was transitory. This is clearly a massive problem when the best minds in the world get this call wrong and not surprisingly, investors have lost their confidence in Central Bankers. Clearly the Fed has strongly changed its tune, and this week marked the official start of the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet shrinkage (which is a further tightening of monetary policy). The big question remains, what the runoff will mean for the economy and bringing inflation back under control. The Fed seems well-aware of this risk and the minutes from the May’s meeting showed that several policy makers noted the tightening of monetary policy plus the run off of the Fed’s balance sheet could interact with vulnerabilities related to the liquidity of markets for US Treasury Securities.
In some more positive news regarding oil supply – OPEC+ agreed to increase production faster in the summer months which should hopefully ease tight markets before the northern hemisphere July and August driving season. US President Biden is planning to visit Saudi Arabia in the hope of turning them towards an alliance in its campaign against Russia. (We of course all remember that Biden has stopped various US oil projects and stopped the building of oil pipelines not so long ago…) As we all know by now, extremely high energy prices are globally a major issue, and an additional spike would be placing additional pressure on inflation.
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