Empower Blog Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA)

RBA Rates Decision – July 2012

Welcoming in the new financial year and after two rate movements in recent times reflecting a total of 75 basis points the RBA is now at the point of sitting on its hands to see the impact of its monetary policy, especially following the recent ‘surprise’ GDP figure showing the economy growing at 4.3% p.a which caught most analysts out. We a...

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Finance Talk: Time to Fix?

What an interesting 6 – 12 months we have seen in the lending markets, if you can cast your minds back a lot of the talk about 12 months ago was around how much more rates were going to increase and should we fix our mortgages or keep them variable? Now with the rates on a downward cycle again we are faced with the challenge of choosing to fix or...

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RBA Rates Decision – June 2012

The RBA reduced interest rates by a further 0.25% at its board meeting today, which surprised some analysts following last month’s 0.5% cut.  This move further highlights the RBA’s belief that Australia is not immune to the world financial and economic events going on around us, even though we are still very much reliant on the Chinese and oth...

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Rental Yields Vs. Term Deposits

With the further cut in the cash rate announced this month by the RBA, the banks will shortly start to announce their new savings deposit rates, which are coming down with each cut. Some commentators are talking about the cash rate getting as low as 2.5% which means it’s cheaper for the banks to access money from the RBA than via customers’ ...

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Chasing the Deal of the Day – Good Luck with That

Over the many years that I have been dealing in mortgage finance I have learnt a lot about this game, especially given the fact that at any point in time I’ve had access to over 600 different loan products at my disposal; from different credit policies, to loan structuring to maximising borrowing capacity etc. But the most important lesson in my ...

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RBA Rates Decision – May 2012

The RBA has just announced a larger than consensus reduction in the cash rate – 50 basis points.  This is a very rare event for a traditionally conservative board.  So much so I have decided to add the entire statement from the RBA governor, Glenn Stephens. “At its meeting today, the Board decided to lower the cash rate by 50 basis poi...

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Stable Market – Good News for Now…

Can we call it yet?…….. Do we have to repeat ourselves again? Will the papers and naysayers' such as the likes of Steven Keen  finally admit they got it wrong (Mind you Steven was claiming  well before the GFC that property values would drop as much as 40%, when in fact property prices since have record double digit growth). So will everyd...

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RBA Rates Decision – April 2012

The RBA has held off on a cash rate movement again this month, as they still appear happy with the current economic activity within the economy. Those doing business in the two biggest state economies of Sydney and Melbourne might disagree about the level of growth they are enjoying! But it’s not the RBA’s job to set cash rates for each state; ...

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RBA Rates Decision – March 2012

The cash rate has been left on hold this month as the RBA believes it has adequately priced the access of money in the economy to ensure the long term growth of the economy. Meanwhile many economists argue the cash rate is too high to stimulate the economic growth, as soft market conditions in the two largest states of NSW and Victoria, have been o...

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RBA Rates Decision – February 2012

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) surprised the broader market this afternoon by leaving the cash rate at 4.25%. One would now expect a bit of media backlash towards the government and RBA for this decision in light of the recent media reports of major job losses in some sectors of the economy. Certainly expect to see the Retailer Association, Ma...

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RBA Rates Decision – December 2011

Although there were plenty tipping this rate cut including the money markets, the RBA’s move to cut rates by a further 25 basis points came as a surprise to me given the minutes of the November meeting suggested it was a close call that we got a rate cut on Melbourne Cup Day. The messages from the RBA following the November cut, was that its Nove...

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RBA Rates Decision – November 2011

Finally the planets have aligned and we have our long awaited cash rate cut of 0.25% bringing the cash rate down to 4.50%. I would think all the banks/lenders will be sensible in passing on this full amount without incident, CBA and Westpac have already done that and now I’d expect the others to follow. However history tells me they will set a da...

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RBA Rates Decision – October 2011

Anyone tired of hearing about the European debt crisis or the US economy yet? Of course we all are, but as the saying goes ‘Money makes the world go around’, so these global events are unfortunately part of Australia and ultimately a part of our personal worlds.  And a clear reminder of this is the equity markets and how they have been so v...

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