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原帖由 丫丫ma 于 2007-5-3 10:46 发表
咋还没有新消息出来啊?
Australia's central bank kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged yesterday as the economy's 16-year expansion gathers pace without triggering inflation.
Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Glenn Stevens left the overnight cash rate target at a six-year-high 6.25 per cent for a fifth straight meeting after raising it a quarter percentage point in November to stem inflation.
Stable interest rates may spur consumer spending and revive a stalled housing market, stoking the economy's expansion. While Australia's three interest-rate increases in 2006 have curbed price gains, inflation in Europe and the UK is picking up even as borrowing costs rise.
"Consumers will celebrate the decision, it will be good for them and that will flow through to the economy," said Gerry Harvey, chairman of Harvey Norman Holdings.
"Our business is recording strong gains and inflation is low. That's a perfect scenario for the economy."
Annual inflation was 2.4 per cent in the first quarter, moving back into the Reserve Bank's target band of between 2 per cent and 3 per cent for the first time in a year.
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AdvertisementHeadline inflation has eased because a rising Australian dollar has cut the cost of imported goods, and banana prices fell following the end of a cyclone-induced shortage.
The currency has risen 5.3 per cent against the US dollar since the start of 2007.
The bank's "trimmed mean" measure of annual underlying inflation, which strips out volatile price movements, was 2.7 per cent in the three months to March 31.
Michael Beagley, managing director of Rodd & Gunn in Sydney, said: "The economy is in a happy place at the moment, so there is no need to change that and increase rates."
The Reserve Bank raised its benchmark rate by a quarter percentage point in May, August and November last year.
"After three policy adjustments made last year, we believed there were grounds to think that the higher inflation outcomes observed up to that time would moderate a little," Mr Stevens told a parliamentary committee in February.
The bank in February forecast annual underlying inflation of 2.75 per cent for 2007. It will issue a new forecast in its quarterly statement on monetary policy tomorrow.
"It's likely the Reserve Bank will have to revise down its inflation forecast, but they'll have to balance that by pointing out that there are still inflation risks," said Rob Henderson, a market economist at National Australia Bank.
The inflation risks come from an accelerating economic growth and a 31-year-low jobless rate that could stoke wage increases.
The economy expanded 1 per cent in the three months to December 31 from the previous quarter, the fastest in more than a year, amid a pickup in consumer spending spurred by employment growth.
Only five of 26 economists surveyed last week expect Stevens will raise rates this year. |
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