Ignore credit card spending data

Tuesday 21 July 2020

A little brouhaha today around new CBA credit card data:

I have been warning against using this as a guide to consumption for some time. This is based on experience. I have seen huge leaps in spending in the past that did not register at all in wider consumption. The state breakdown makes the point nicely:

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About the author

David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.