RBA Chart Pack

The RBA Chart Pack, titled Graphs on the Australian Economy and Financial Markets, comes from the Reserve Bank of Australia. It summarises macroeconomic and financial market trends in Australia and adds context on its main trading partners. It is not a single index, not a forecast and not the policy decision itself. Each graph reuses its own source, such as ABS catalogues and RBA statistical tables, with footnotes naming each source.

The pack is updated 8 times a year since February 2024, after National Accounts and CPI inflation releases. It appears on the day after each Monetary Policy Board meeting, and the publication calendar gives the dates. Release is at 11:30 am Sydney time, AEDT in daylight-saving months and AEST otherwise. Each vintage carries a Data as at line about one week before release.

Each release offers the complete PDF and single graphs with a Data Availability source table. Each vintage supersedes the previous one through source revisions, after a monthly rule before February 2024.

The housing lens sits in the Household Sector, one of 17 sections, and links income, wealth and debt to prices and loans.

• Household Income and Consumption: real annual consumption growth, showing spending power behind housing demand.
• Consumer Sentiment: the average of ANZ-Roy Morgan and Westpac-Melbourne Institute views of personal finances against a year earlier.
• Private Dwelling Investment, Private Residential Building Approvals: chain-volume building investment and the monthly approvals count as the supply pipeline.
• Housing Prices: year-ended growth across measures, showing price momentum.
• Housing Prices and Household Debt, Household Wealth and Liabilities: ratios to household disposable income, showing leverage.
• Housing Loan Commitments: new credit demand excluding refinancing, split across total, owner-occupier and investor loans.

The cash rate target rose from 0.10% on May 4, 2022 to 3.10% on December 7, 2022. The rise totalled 300 basis points across 8 straight moves, reaching 2.60% on October 5, 2022. The October 2022 vintage showed the step path in the target chart beside housing prices, debt, loans and rates, with no forecast or signal. Readers thus watch policy pass-through to housing with about one week of source lag, not one housing print.

1. Compilation, not one formula: each graph plots its source series as labelled, using levels, year-ended change or ratios, with footnotes naming sources.
2. Year-ended growth: divide the current level by the level four quarters or 12 months earlier, subtract one and multiply by 100. A level of 120.0 against 115.0 a year earlier gives 4.35%.
3. Seasonal adjustment: the RBA removes the regular seasonal pattern, then plots the series and computes growth on it, with no further steps stated.
4. Household income bases: debt and wealth ratios use income after tax and before interest deduction, including unincorporated enterprises. Consumption income is after tax and interest, with a saving ratio net of depreciation.
5. Sentiment averaging: consumer sentiment averages ANZ-Roy Morgan and Westpac-Melbourne Institute views of personal finances, rescaling ANZ-Roy Morgan to the Westpac average since 1996.
6. Price adjustments: interest charges are excluded before September 1998, with adjustment for the 1999-2000 tax changes. Underlying inflation measures also exclude deposit and loan facilities before September 2011.