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1. According to Cotality, dwelling values in Australia fell 0.7% m/m over July (-0.5% m/m seasonally adjusted) and are 2% lower since the March peak.

2. The decline in nationwide dwelling values in June was revised to be larger…

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1. Housing credit growth in Australia was unchanged in June at +0.55% m/m.

Investor housing credit growth remained strong at +0.81% m/m and owner-occupier housing credit growth continued to be more moderate at +0.45% m/m.

Evidence of sharply lower new housing loan applications in Q2 should weigh on housing credit growth in the near term.

2. Housing credit growth in New Zealand remained sluggish at +0.4% m/m in June. Owner-occupier credit growth is particularly soft.

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1. ANZ’s July survey of businesses in New Zealand revealed another sharp improvement in firms’ activity outlook.

Kiwi firms’ reported that activity compared with a year ago picked up slightly in July.

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Underlying inflation in Australia in Q2 was softer than expected, including by the RBA.

Trimmed mean inflation in monthly, quarterly and year-ended terms for both June and Q2 was ~0.1ppts below our nowcasts. Much of the downside surprise related to weaker-than-expected travel inflation in June.

We continue to expect the Board to keep the cash rate unchanged in August but maintain a hawkish bias given underlying inflation remains above target. Market pricing for an August hike evaporated post-CPI.

1. Australia’s CPI for the month of June fell 0.1% m/m in both original and seasonally adjusted terms. This was softer than our nowcasts for small increases.

In 3-month average terms, headline inflation was +0.6% q/q in Q2 in both original and seasonally adjusted terms. These were slightly lower than our nowcasts.

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1. Preliminary estimates suggest that the number of filled jobs in New Zealand rose just +0.1% m/m in June but has been on a gradual rising trend.

2. Filled jobs growth was just +0.6% y/y, with jobs in services industries rising +0.8% y/y but goods-related jobs fell 0.3% y/y (though are now gradually expanding).

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1. The value of new housing loan commitments in New Zealand dipped a little lower in June, including to purchase or build housing.

2. The number of new housing loan commitments in New Zealand also fell modestly in June but rose slightly for home purchases or building.

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1. Australia’s flash composite PMI for July rose to 52.6 from 50.4 in June. Survey responses are collected in the second half of the month. We wouldn’t be surprised to see the PMI revised lower in the final reading.

2. The pick-up in Australia’s composite PMI and reported business conditions in July is unlikely to have factored in the sharp rise in oil prices.

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Australia’s labour force report for June was solid overall…

…but labour market conditions clearly softened in the June quarter overall amid heightened conflict-related uncertainty.

The total labour underutilisation rate rose to the highest level since late 2021.

The monthly data have been volatile.

Some of that volatility is likely to be genuine, with the sharp rise in employment in June possibly reflecting progress on the Middle East situation (at the time).

The ABS noted that “[p]art of the growth in employment this month came from those who were waiting to start a job in May”. The ABS noted a similar positive effect on employment in May.

In other words, firms pushed back start dates for new hires until they had a bit more certainty on the near-term outlook.

Renewed tensions in the Middle East and sharply higher oil prices may weigh again on hiring.

The ABS has also been transitioning the Labour Force Survey to new modernised systems and questionnaire since April. The May and June surveys both rotated 2 of the 8 sample cohorts instead of the usual 1 group rotation.

For June, the ABS noted that it adjusted the weighting of one rotation group in New South Wales and Victoria:

“[t]he ABS identified that data from one of the incoming rotation groups for June in New South Wales and Victoria were considerably different in their labour force characteristics, compared with the rest of the sample in these states. These differences were outside the tolerance ranges of several of our quality assurance tests. In response, the ABS adjusted the influence of around 2,700 respondents (approximately 6% of June sample), from these parts of the sample by using adjusted weights in line with our well-established methods to ensure that the Labour Force data is representative of the population.

1. Australia’s unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.4% in June (in unrounded terms it rose from 4.37% to 4.43%).

Measured employment in Australia rose +76.3k m/m in June following a rise of +44k m/m in May.

The employment-to-population ratio jumped +0.25ppts to 64.04% in June - the highest since July 2025.

2. The unemployment rate in June was still clearly higher than the RBA’s May SMP track. The jobless rate averaged 4.43% in Q2 compared with the RBA’s 4.2% forecast.

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1. According to Jobs & Skills Australia, the number of new online job ads rose +0.7% m/m in June but remained well below the most recent peak in January.

2. The stock of online job ads - as measured by ANZ-Indeed - has held up a bit better recently than the flow of new job ads.

While short periods of divergence aren’t unusual, this may reflect that heightened uncertainty has weighed on firms’ appetite to newly advertise vacant jobs at the same time that firms are on the go-slow filling vacant jobs.

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1. The number of new house sales by large Australian builders fell 4.6% m/m in June and the 3-month average also declined.

Allowing for lags, we are likely to see building approvals for detached houses starting to lose momentum soon.

A lot of the volatility in new house sales has been in Victoria.

2. Aussie firms reported an increase in recruitment difficulties in June following a noticeable easing over the prior 2 months.

The number of jobs vacant for longer than 1 month also increased in June but has trended a little lower this year.

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1. New Zealand’s Q2 CPI inflation was +1.5% q/q and +4.1% y/y.

This was slightly higher than our nowcast of +1.4% q/q and +4.0% y/y. The RBNZ’s updated nowcast was +3.9% y/y.

Petrol and other automotive fuels contributed nearly 1ppt to quarterly headline inflation as expected.

Non-tradables inflation was in line with our estimate despite a much stronger than expected increase in new housing purchase (+1.6% q/q).

Property maintenance material prices also rose a strong +2.4% q/q, pointing to pass-through of higher construction materials costs emanating from the Middle East conflict.

Overall home ownership contributed +0.15ppts to quarterly headline inflation in original terms. Household energy added a further +0.14ppts as expected.

Our measure of quarterly trimmed mean inflation declined a little in Q2 and suggested that underlying inflation remained contained, though was above the 2% target mid-point (see below).

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1. Food prices in New Zealand (19% CPI weight) rose +0.6% m/m and +2.5% y/y in June in original terms but declined slightly post seasonal adjustment.

Stronger global food price inflation is likely to flow through to New Zealand’s food prices with a short lag.

2. Kiwi food prices rose +0.4% q/q in Q2 in original terms…

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1. According to MBIE, the number of online job ads in New Zealand rose +4.5% m/m in June based on our seasonal adjustment. Job ads returned to the level in January.

2. The improving trend in measures of job ads for New Zealand continues to point to a lower unemployment rate going forward.

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1. Nominal domestic spending using debit and credit cards in New Zealand declined 1.2% m/m in June (ex fuel fell by the same amount).

‘Core’ retail spending fell 1.5% m/m, with durables (-3.9% m/m), apparel (-2.2% m/m) and hospitality (-1.9% m/m) spending the weakest categories.

2. Kiwi’s card-based spending rose +0.5% q/q in Q2 but grew just +0.1% q/q excluding fuel purchases. ‘Core’ retail spending also rose just +0.1% q/q.

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1. Measures of consumer sentiment in Australia remained weak in early July despite improving this month.

2. Australians’ perceptions of their own finances versus a year ago rose in July but remained weak.

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1. New Zealand’s composite PMI - the PCI - rose sharply in June to 51.2. The new orders component declined to 53.1.

2. Many economies experienced improving composite PMIs in June as the Middle East situation calmed, though that may now be at risk.

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1. Last week we highlighted an unusual divergence between the different historical and ‘new’ underemployment rates published by the ABS for Australia - see chart.

Well, recent observations for the historical series were wrong. The ABS said this:

The ABS has identified a systems error which led to the underemployment and underutilisation data originally published in this release to be incorrect. This issue does not affect the core Labour Force measures. That is, it does not affect employment, the unemployment rate, the participation rate or hours worked data.

The corrected data (for the black line below) now show a clearer recent pick-up in the underemployment rate in a broadly similar fashion to the newer, more narrowly based, measure published by the ABS (orange line).

These things can happen, but the timing is unfortunate as it coincides with the ABS’ overhaul of the labour force survey (the so-called Modernising the Labour Force Survey).

Big changes to the LFS can be challenging and while the ABS has noted that it is closely quality assuring the data through the changes, we always worry that things can go wrong given they have in the past when survey overhauls have occurred.

2. The recent increase in Australia’s underemployment rate has not been uniform across age groups. The clearest increase has been for young workers aged 15-24 years old.

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1. The number of dwelling commencements in Australia fell 11.2% q/q in Q1 to an annualised 192k.

Detached house starts declined 3.6% q/q while higher-density starts fell 19.8% q/q.

2. The number of dwellings actually completed in Australia in Q1 fell 0.4% q/q to an annualised 175.3k.

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1. The weighted-average interest rate on outstanding housing loans in Australia rose to 6.28% in May but declined a little further to 4.83% in New Zealand.

2. There is also more than a 100bp gap between the weighted-average interest rates on new housing loans in Australia and New Zealand.

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1. Melbourne Institute’s trimmed mean inflation gauge declined again in June using our seasonal adjustment. Looking through the monthly volatility, the trimmed mean gauge moderated a little in 3m/3m terms.

2. Directionally, Melbourne Institute’s trimmed mean inflation measure has recently provided a good steer on official quarterly trimmed mean inflation.

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