ANZ's monthly Business Outlook Survey, this for December 2018

Business Confidence improvise to -24.1

  • its highest in 8 months
  • prior -37.1

Activity Outlook up also, to 13.6

  • highest in 7 months
  • prior 7.6

NZD likes it, marked up a few points on the release.

Sub measures showing (highlights):

  • Employment intentions improved
  • investment intentions improved
  • profitability still negative

ANZ comments:

business confidence lifted meaningfully

  • That said, it remains in the red, with a net 24% of respondents reporting they expect general business conditions to deteriorate in the year ahead.

More importantly, firms' perceptions of their own activity rose 6 points to a net 14% expecting a lift.

As part of the survey, ANZ ask on expectations for inflation:

  • 2.15% from the November survey's 2.29%

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Background to this here: