ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence was up 0.8 points to 84.9 this week.
Despite the increase, consumer confidence has now spent a record 86 straight weeks below the mark of 85. The index is now 8.5 points above the same week a year ago, September 18-24, 2023 (76.4), and now 2.8 points above the 2024 weekly average of 82.1.
ANZ economist Madeline Dunk said confidence has been unable to break the 85-point ceiling for 19 months.
“In the 1990s, recession confidence stayed below 85 points for nine months,” she said.
Dunk added that this week’s rise was driven by an improvement in household confidence in the economic outlook.
“Confidence about the next 12 months rose 2.7 points and confidence about the next five years lifted 3.0 points. Both were at their highest levels since Q1 this year.
“This may be related to last week’s stronger-than-expected labour market data, which showed employment had increased by more than 143,000 in three months, with participation at a record high. This may be easing fear of job losses.
“We expect the labour market to remain resilient and see only a modest lift in the unemployment rate to 4.4 per cent.”
Looking across the index, now 23 per cent (up 1ppt) of Australians say their families are ‘better off’ financially than this time last year compared to 48 per cent (unchanged) that say their families are ‘worse off’.
Views on personal finances over the next year are virtually unchanged this week with Australians now just in positive territory with just over a third of respondents(34 per cent - up 1ppt), expecting their family to be ‘better off’ financially this time next year while 31 per cent (up 1ppt) expect to be ‘worse off’.
One-in-ten Australians (10 per cent - up 1ppt) of Australians expect ‘good times’ for the Australian economy over the next twelve months compared to 31 per cent (down 1ppt) that expect ‘bad times’.
Net sentiment regarding the Australian economy in the longer term improved slightly this week with 13 per cent (up 1ppt) of Australians expecting ‘good times’ for the economy over the next five years compared to 19 per cent (down 2ppts) expecting ‘bad times’.
Meanwhile, buying intentions were little changed this week with 22 per cent (down 1ppt) saying now is a ‘good time to buy’ major household items, compared to a large plurality of 49 per cent (up 1ppt) that say now is a ‘bad time to buy’ major household items.