Australia: Annual credit growth slips to 3.9% - Westpac

Andrew Hanlan, analyst at Westpac, explains that for the Australian private sector credit, it’s a case of another month and another soft update with credit growth has moderating to a slow pace led by the housing downturn.

Key Quotes

“The positive is that the pace of decline for the housing sector appears to have eased early in 2019.”

“In March, credit grew by 0.3%, including a +0.25% for housing, a -0.3% for personal and a +0.5% for business.”

“Annual credit growth slipped below 4%, to 3.9%, for the first time since the end of 2013. The 3 month annualised pace is 3.1%, following a 2.8% for February - the weakest result since early 2013.”

“Credit growth has progressively slowed since expanding by 6.6% in 2015, with growth moderating to 5.6% in 2016, +4.8% in 2017 and +4.3% in 2018.”