A preview for the data, this sector has been struggling.

Retail sales is published at the same time as Q2 exports data (preview here: Some positive news expected from Australian data today on exports)

Via Westpac (bolding mine, just the one word yeah):

  • Monthly retail sales posted a reasonable 0.4% gain in June, the best monthly result since Feb. That said, the detail suggests some of this was price-related rather than volume driven. The wider picture is also still bleak, annual sales growth running at just 2.5%yr and virtually flat for underlying volumes.
  • Coming months will see a boost from recent policy measures - two 25bp cuts in interest rates in June and July and tax offsets for low to middle income earners injecting around $16bn into household cash flows. Even if much of this is saved, the portion spent is likely to give a sizeable lift to retail sales, which run at $27bn a month. However, the direct impact is likely to be small in July with tax refunds only starting from around mid-month. Given the very clear headwinds still affecting consumer demand, we expect the net impact in July to result in another lacklustre 0.3% gain.

Later today, RBA: