Australian data - Commonwealth Bank / Markit Services and Composite PMIs for August

Big falls on the month for both of these.

Key points from the report:

  • Activity levels in the Australian service sector continued to rise in August,
  • At the slowest rate since the start of 2017
  • New business growth also weakened
  • However, companies continued to add to their workforce numbers at a noticeable rate, which enabled them to broadly keep on top of their workloads.
  • Latest data showed operating costs continuing to increase, which led to the strongest rise in output prices recorded by the survey since July 2016.

Commenting on the Commonwealth Bank Services and Composite PMI data, Gareth Aird, Senior Economist at the Commonwealth Bank:

  • "Australia's services sector is in good health. Employment growth, in particular, is indicative of expansion in the sector."
  • "The pullback in the headline index is a little disappointing, but the broader trends remain encouraging. The sharp lift in operating expenses is being offset by an increase in prices charged. This suggests that demand growth has picked up. And it should exert some upward pressure on the inflation pulse of the economy"

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We get another services PMI from Australia soon, due at the bottom of the hour:

AiG Services PMI August

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Earlier from CBA this month: