DECEMBER KEY FIGURES

			Sep Qtr 10 to Dec Qtr 10	Dec Qtr 09 to Dec Qtr 10
			%	%
Sales of goods and services (Chain volume measures)
	Manufacturing
		Trend	-0.4	(a)na
		Seasonally Adjusted	0.8	-6.3
	Wholesale trade
		Trend	-0.5	-3.6
		Seasonally Adjusted	0.8	-4.2
Inventories (Chain volume measures)
	Trend		-0.2	0.2
	Seasonally Adjusted		0.7	0.6
Company gross operating profits
	Trend		-1.7	(a)na
	Seasonally Adjusted		-2.8	14.7
Wages and salaries
	Seasonally Adjusted		1.5	8.0
na not available
(a) See paragraph 20 of Technical Notes for more information

Inventories (volume terms), Trend estimates

Company gross operating profits, Trend estimates

DECEMBER KEY POINTS


CHAIN VOLUME ESTIMATES

• The trend estimate for inventories fell 0.2% in the December quarter 2010. The seasonally adjusted estimate rose 0.7% this quarter.
• The trend estimate for Manufacturing sales of goods and services fell 0.4% this quarter. The seasonally adjusted estimate rose 0.8%.
• The trend estimate for Wholesale trade sales of goods and services fell 0.5% this quarter. The seasonally adjusted estimate rose 0.8%.

CURRENT PRICE ESTIMATES

• The seasonally adjusted estimate for company gross operating profits fell 2.8% in the December quarter 2010.
• The seasonally adjusted estimate for wages and salaries rose 1.5% in the December quarter 2010.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE (QUARTER)	Release Date
March 2011	30 May 2011
June 2011	29 August 2011
September 2011	28 November 2011
December 2011	27 February 2012

IMPACT OF THE FLOODS

Heavy rain and flooding occurred in Queensland in December 2010. This publication presents the first significant economic impact of this and floods in other states on the Quarterly Business Indicators Survey.

Data collection activities for December quarter 2010, particularly in Queensland, were affected by the floods, however, this has not affected the data quality or reliability of the Australian series. The estimates for Queensland, particularly in the mining industry, have been impacted by lower than usual response rates to the survey and therefore should be used with caution.


COMPARISON BETWEEN COMPANY GROSS OPERATING PROFITS AND GROSS OPERATING SURPLUS

Valuation changes have had an impact on the value of inventories held by Australian businesses this quarter. An inventories valuation adjustment (IVA) is applied in the calculation of the gross operating surplus of private non-financial corporations (GOS) estimate in the Australian National Accounts. The IVA for the December quarter 2010 is (-$972m) which is $2,409m lower than the September quarter 2010 IVA of $1,437m.

No adjustment is made to the company gross operating profits (CGOP) estimate in this publication and, as a result, users should exercise caution when comparing CGOP and GOS. It should be noted that there are other differences between the two series. In particular, changes are made to GOS when annual benchmarks are applied and slightly different seasonal factors apply to the two series. Given this, while CGOP movements are an appropriate indicator for GOS, the two series will not have equivalent seasonally adjusted movements from quarter to quarter.


INQUIRIES

For further information about these and related statistics, contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070 or Didier Rivet on Sydney (02) 9268 4900.