Some remarks here from Shane Oliver, chief economist at AMP in Sydney

(AMP are a huge Australian fund manager)

  • Says he expects first-quarter GDP growth around 0.2%
  • He had been forecasting 0.5-0.6%
  • Says Sluggish data "all points to growth being only marginally positive at this stage and there's certainly the risk of a negative quarter"

Concerns are gaining on weaker:

  • Home building
  • Net exports
  • Household consumption

And also on Cyclone Debbie that hit Queensland's key coal mining region in late March & is expected to subtract from growth in Q2

Bloomberg have more here

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I posted on Firday to expect more of this sort of chatter in the next 2 weeks: AUD/USD traders - a quick heads up to the freak outs coming over the next 2 weeks