Among the mainland states, confidence increased in NSW and South Australia, while it was down in Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia.
“Weekly inflation expectations” jumped 0.5ppt to 6.6 per cent, its highest weekly value in over a decade.
The subindex results were mixed with the “current financial conditions” falling 2.9 per cent, dropping to its lowest since the early stages of the pandemic and “future financial conditions” falling 4.2 per cent, dropping 11.4 per cent over the past three weeks.
“Current economic conditions” were down 4.3 per cent, after a 1.5 per cent decline the week before. “Future economic conditions” rose slightly by 0.7 per cent.
“Time to buy a major household item” rose 2.7 per cent, after declining 11 per cent over the previous three weeks.
ANZ head of Australian economics, David Plank, said the federal budget has had no clear positive impact.
“The Q3 CPI hitting a 32-year high has pushed household inflation expectations to 6.6 per cent, their highest since February 2011,” he said.
“The share of people who think they are financially worse off than the same time last year has risen to 47 per cent, the highest value for this indicator in over three decades. Cost of living concerns, along with expectations of more rate hikes by the RBA, have caused confidence to decline to levels last seen during the early weeks of the COVID lockdowns.
“This is also reflected in the 15.6 per cent decline in confidence among people paying off their mortgages over the past six weeks.
“The continued decline in confidence seems to finally be having some impact on spending. ANZ data for October indicates the usual run-up in spending seen late in the month is not occurring.”
