Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA)
Headlines via Reuters:
- Whether further tightening of monetary policy is required to ensure that inflation returns to target in a reasonable timeframe will depend upon the data and the evolving assessment of risks
- Board remains resolute in its determination to return inflation to target
- The limited information received on the domestic economy since the November meeting has been broadly in line with expectations
- Outlook for household consumption also remains uncertain
- The monthly CPI indicator for October suggested that inflation is continuing to moderate, driven by the goods sector; the inflation update did not, however, provide much more information on services inflation.
- Measures of inflation expectations remain consistent with the inflation target
- Conditions in the labour market also continued to ease gradually, although they remain tight.
- Domestically, there are uncertainties regarding the lags in the effect of monetary policy
- Higher interest rates are working to establish a more sustainable balance between aggregate supply and demand in the economy.
- Holding the cash rate steady at this meeting will allow time to assess the impact of the increases in interest rates on demand, inflation and the labour market.
Bolding is mine. The statement explicitly nodding to data-dependence.
This is a reasonably neutral sort of statement from the Governor, even leaning a little dovish. Bullock has been more aggressively hawkish in her public comments leading up to this meeting. A dissonant statement this.
Full text:
The next official quarterly inflation data is due on January 31 2024, with the next RBA meeting following closely behind on February 5 and 6.
