sram466

Hi, thought of sharing this piece of not-so-good news ...are the signs really there?

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Wed, Mar 18, 2009 AFP

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - Australia is heading for a recession, according to a monthly economic index compiled by one of the country's largest banks released Wednesday.
The monthly Westpac-Melbourne Institute leading index, which predicts the likely pace of economic activity three to nine months into the future, was -3.1 percent in January, its worst reading in almost 18 years.
Westpac senior economist Matthew Hassan said the index had been lower on only four occasions in its 49-year history - the early 1960s, mid-70s, early 80s and early 90s.
"Each of these was followed by recessions in the Australian economy," Hassan said.
He said deep interest rate cuts since September and stimulus measures worth more than 50 billion dollars (33 billion US) should help cushion the Australian economy from a recession as intense as the 1990s.
"Both monetary and fiscal policy has been eased aggressively and early," he said.
"At the same time, Australia is not having to deal with the same sort of problems that badly undermined the banking system in the early 1990s - the sharply unwinding boom in commercial property in particular."
Australia recorded its first quarter of negative growth in eight years in the final three months of 2008.
Most economists predict a similar result in the current quarter, which would officially put Australia in recession, usually defined as two successive quarters of negative growth.

Edo

Wow, seems like finally we should get ready to pay the price for sending our troops to far off lands without any considerable reason. I hope someone learns a lesson from this recession.

Budgie

"Wow, seems like finally we should get ready to pay the price for sending our troops to far off lands without any considerable reason. I hope someone learns a lesson from this recession."

Sorry, don't see your logic there....

homewardbound

Its a global recession... hardly new news and unexpected.

bigAPE

x2

<insert country name here> heading for Recession

Yes, we know...

bu1lder

Again...................."we're all doooomed."

Sally Simpson

Laurence Springborg says we are not in a recession. I do love a politician with his head stuck in the sand , so I'm sticking with that one!

ABCDiamond

Kevin Rudd and Anna Bligh both said the same, at about the same time

The thing is, they were all correct as well.
When they said it, we still had a positive GDP.

But now, almost 3 months later, we are getting closer to the day that they will be able to say that we are officially in a recession.

Zambia

Why you havent, you think its about troops.

Sadly the issue is a lot bigger than that. And have been said to death.

Seriously I remember coming out of the last recession. It was not great but everyone survived. The sky may be full of clouds but its not F88King falling.

I will try and save a link to the song "dont worry be happy" so I can sing it at the next bloke that pastes the diatribe of eejits telling us how its going be when only 2 years ago they would have bet our pensions on property. Well maybe just mine.

Anyway easy street is over and thanks to the Downturn Im back to hard work and I have lost 5-6 kilos. See silver lining right F&&king there.

I may be poor but I look fantastic, except I cant afford a new belt and my trousers keep falling down. But on the flipside I live in Oz and everyone shows the crack now and again.

dinner-dash

" Dont tell them your name Pike "

hantsfamily1

Well said Zambia.....made me laugh out loud.

Not too much changes and if everyone thinks life is always going to be on the up then think again....you dont need a crystal ball to know that good times are followed by bad times.

Mostly life will go on the same as it always does and the big boys will lose money they never really had then make it back again.

After this crunch loads of big companies will have written off billions of debt and will be ready to make it again.

House market will level and lower for a bit then go up a bit again...etc etc.

Seen it all before and we will see it again one day.

Mean while its still sunny and the beach is for free....

kaungchiau

I think we need to look at things in context.

I have never been to Australia but I think it is not as bad as UK. For a start, not a single Aussie bank requires bail out. At the same time, China is prepare to spend money to buy minerals and other natural resources.

Australia will do OK.

Edo

Well, let the troops of the western powers stay in afghanistan and iraq for a few more years and then you will definitely be able to see what I'm talking about. If you thought that this recession is a result of just the collapse of the housing market and irresponsible lending and everything to do with the word 'economy', then you need to patiently do some more research about the other factors that are bringing us to our knees.

ABCDiamond

Interesting comment. I heard on the radio today that the IMF have said that once the USA and UK banks recover to the same level that the Australian banks are at, the problems will be near enough over.

Brisben

I agree but that is only a proportion of Australian income.

There has been a massive negative impact on mining in Australia, directly due to the downturn in manufacturing in China, thus needing less coal.

Tourism has been hit hard, no one from overseas has money to come here.

Banks are better off, which provides some stability, but like all the other banks, they have become cautious about lending, which is a good thing, but does have an impact.

Your right we are better off than some places, but equally some say we are always a few months behind Europe.

Who knows. Just sit tight and hope we can all ride it out.