Why is the Australian market underperforming?
Until Canberra gets serious about national economic issues, the country is likely to remain in the global backwater and its financial markets will underperform.
The underperformance of 2017 has continued into the early weeks of 2018. Most macro indicators are positive and interest rates are at historical lows, but the Australian equity market exhibits little conviction. Consensus forecasts are for another positive year, and while it is early days, the upcoming earnings season had better exceed expectations, otherwise the underperformance is likely to continue.
The Australian economy created 403,000 new jobs in 2017, of which 303,000 were full time. This is a very strong outcome. Due to a higher participation rate of 65.7 per cent in December, which is the highest level since January 2011 and just shy of the all-time high of 65.8 per cent in November 2010, the unemployment rate fell from 5.8 per cent in December 2016 to 5.5 per cent.
Consumer sentiment as measured by the Westpac/Melbourne Institute Index improved in January to 105.1 from 103.3 in December. The uptick reflects a "less threatening outlook for interest rates and improving confidence around the economy and jobs." The mood is "cautiously optimistic" rather than buoyant and the latest reading is the best since late 2013 and the most positive start to a calendar year since 2010.
The National Australia Bank's monthly business survey for November saw business conditions give back the gains of October, but the reading is still elevated and "well above the long-run average and are at solid levels across most of the economy."
While there was a slight deterioration in business confidence the reading remains positive. Respondents were particularly concerned with the outlook for consumer demand, pressure on margins and government policy.
Concerns around energy eased, while greater importance was placed on wages costs than the previous quarter and these are now of much greater concern. This is difficult to understand with wages growth still well below trend, although a return to industrial unrest with a train strike called for Sydney, may alter the landscape.
Why, with all these macros positive, is the stock market struggling? The elevated A$ is taking the shine off exports but prices remain strong, comfortably offsetting any volume declines. After two surprising successive trade deficits in October and November, Australia should be back in surplus in December and into 2018.
Australia's total labour force at 2017 year-end totalled 13.17m--12.44m employed and 730,600 unemployed--for an unemployment rate of 5.5 per cent. Unemployed looking for full-time work stood at 501,800. There is still spare capacity in the labour market working against a meaningful lift in wages. The 403,000 jobs created represented 3.06 per cent of the labour force. This was a better performance than the US, reflecting the higher unemployment rate.
Comparatively, in the US a total of 2.055 million non-farm jobs were created in 2017 with the participation rate a lowly 62.7 per cent. Total labour force was 160.6m--154m employed and 6.6m unemployed--for a 4.1 per cent unemployment rate. Jobs created in 2017 represented 1.28 per cent of the labour force.
According to the National Australia Bank's business survey, one of the main concerns of Australian business is government policy, or the lack of it. The most vigorous debates of the past six months have been around social issues involving same-sex marriage, changing the date of Australia Day, and the Republic chestnut. Hardly a serious attempt at economic reform, draining a bloated Lake Burley Griffin--Australia's Washington-like swamp--or cutting red tape.
Until Canberra gets serious about national economic issues to halt a falling standard of living and create an equitable sharing of the economic output, the country is likely to remain in the global backwater and its financial markets will underperform.
US$ in the hands of central bankers
The slide in the US$ has surprised, particularly against the €. Some suggest the European Central Bank (ECB) will become more aggressive than the US Federal Reserve (the Fed) over the course of 2018, as both move to normalise their respective bloated balance sheets.
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Peter Warnes is Morningstar's head of equities research. Any Morningstar ratings/recommendations contained in this report are based on the full research report available from Morningstar.
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