ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence drops 1.2pts to 79.9 – lowest since early in the pandemic in April 2020
ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence fell 1.2pts to 79.9 this week and is now a large 28.5pts below the same week a year ago, October 30/31, 2021 (108.4). In addition, Consumer Confidence has now dropped for five straight weeks (the longest series of declines for over two years since August 2020) and is now 9.9pts below the 2022 weekly average of 89.8.
Although the broad-based decline in Consumer Confidence continued this week there was a mixed picture when looking at the States with the measure down in Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia, but up in NSW and South Australia. Across the index the questions that drove the drop related to sentiment in regards to people’s personal finances with both down.
Current financial conditions
- Now 21% of Australians (down 2ppts) say their families are ‘better off’ financially than this time last year compared to 47% (up 1ppt) that say their families are ‘worse off’ financially (the highest figure for this indicator since March 28/29, 2020 (rounded) and the highest figure for this indicator (46.9%) to one decimal place since August 1992 – 48.4%).
Future financial conditions
- Looking forward, just over a quarter of Australians, 28% (down 1ppt), expect their family to be ‘better off’ financially this time next year while 37% (up 3ppts), expect to be ‘worse off’.
Current economic conditions
- Only 6% (down 1ppt) of Australians expect ‘good times’ for the Australian economy over the next twelve months compared to more than two-fifths, 41% (up 1ppt), that expect ‘bad times.’
Future economic conditions
- Sentiment regarding the Australian economy in the longer term is virtually unchanged this week with 13% (up 1ppt) of Australians expecting ‘good times’ for the economy over the next five years compared to 19% (up 1ppt) expecting ‘bad times’.
Time to buy a major household item
- When it comes to buying intentions now 22% (down 1ppt) of Australians, say now is a ‘good time to buy’ major household items while more than twice as many, 47% (down 3ppts), say now is a ‘bad time to buy’.
ANZ Head of Australian Economics, David Plank, commented:
Consumer confidence decreased 1.5% last week, with the federal budget having no clear positive impact. The Q3 CPI hitting a 32-year high has pushed household inflation expectations to 6.6%, their highest since February 2011. The share of people who think they are financially worse off than the same time last year has risen to 47%, 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% 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.
Related Research Reports
The latest Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence Monthly Report is available on the Roy Morgan Online Store. It provides demographic breakdowns for Age, Sex, State, Region (Capital Cities/ Country), Generations, Lifecycle, Socio-Economic Scale, Work Status, Occupation, Home Ownership, Voting Intention, Roy Morgan Value Segments and more
Consumer Confidence – Monthly Detailed Report in Australia.
Business Confidence – Monthly Detailed Report in Australia.
Consumer Banking Satisfaction - Monthly Report in Australia.
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Margin of Error
The margin of error to be allowed for in any estimate depends mainly on the number of interviews on which it is based. Margin of error gives indications of the likely range within which estimates would be 95% likely to fall, expressed as the number of percentage points above or below the actual estimate. Allowance for design effects (such as stratification and weighting) should be made as appropriate.
| Sample Size | Percentage Estimate |
| 40% – 60% | 25% or 75% | 10% or 90% | 5% or 95% | |
| 1,000 | ±3.0 | ±2.7 | ±1.9 | ±1.3 |
| 5,000 | ±1.4 | ±1.2 | ±0.8 | ±0.6 |
| 7,500 | ±1.1 | ±1.0 | ±0.7 | ±0.5 |
| 10,000 | ±1.0 | ±0.9 | ±0.6 | ±0.4 |
| 20,000 | ±0.7 | ±0.6 | ±0.4 | ±0.3 |
| 50,000 | ±0.4 | ±0.4 | ±0.3 | ±0.2 |
