APRIL KEY FIGURES

		Mar 2011	Apr 2011	Mar 2011 to Apr 2011
		$m	$m	% change
TREND ESTIMATES
	Housing finance for owner occupation(a)	13 488	13 340	-1.1
	Personal finance	6 758	6 631	-1.9
	Commercial finance	30 574	30 299	-0.9
	Lease finance	422	422	0.1
SEASONALLY ADJUSTED ESTIMATES
	Housing finance for owner occupation(a)	12 991	13 805	6.3
	Personal finance	6 719	6 748	0.4
	Commercial finance	32 205	29 383	-8.8
	Lease finance	427	436	2.3
(a) Excludes alterations and additions

Personal finance

Commercial finance

APRIL KEY POINTS


APRIL 2011 COMPARED WITH MARCH 2011:

HOUSING FINANCE FOR OWNER OCCUPATION

• The total value of owner occupied housing commitments excluding alterations and additions fell 1.1% in trend terms, while the seasonally adjusted series rose 6.3%.

PERSONAL FINANCE

• The trend series for the value of total personal finance commitments fell 1.9%. Revolving credit commitments fell 3.1% and fixed lending commitments fell 0.8%.
• The seasonally adjusted series for the value of total personal finance commitments rose 0.4%. Fixed lending commitments rose 3.3%, while revolving credit commitments fell 2.8%.

COMMERCIAL FINANCE

• The trend series for the value of total commercial finance commitments fell 0.9%. Fixed lending commitments fell 1.1% and revolving credit commitments fell 0.5%.
• The seasonally adjusted series for the value of total commercial finance commitments fell 8.8%. Fixed lending commitments fell 11.8%, after a 15.2% rise in the previous month. Revolving credit commitments fell 1.8%.

LEASE FINANCE

• The trend series for the value of total lease finance commitments rose 0.1% and the seasonally adjusted series rose 2.3%.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE	Release Date
May 2011	13 July 2011
June 2011	10 August 2011
July 2011	12 September 2011
August 2011	17 October 2011
September 2011	14 November 2011
October 2011	13 December 2011

REVISIONS

In this issue revisions have been made to the original series as a result of improved reporting of survey and administrative data. These revisions impact on:

• Commercial finance values for March 2011;
• Personal finance values for total credit limits at end of month and cancellations and reductions for March 2011;
• Investment housing for March 2011; and
• Owner occupied housing finance values for the period January 2011 to March 2011.

Seasonally adjusted and trend series have been revised as a result of revisions to the original series, the incorporation of estimates for the latest month and the revision of seasonal factors due to the concurrent seasonal adjustment methodology.


IMPACT OF THE FLOODS

Flooding began in late December 2010 in Queensland, and was more extensive in both Queensland and other states in January 2011. On a month to month basis, original and seasonally adjusted series can be impacted by a number of factors including interest rates, supply constraints, consumer confidence and unusual influences. The specific impact of floods on the estimates in this publication can not be quantified. National estimates for personal, commercial and lease finance are seasonally adjusted. The state and territory estimates (available as time series spreadsheets) are not seasonally adjusted.

The trend series provide an estimate of the underlying behavior of a series over time but, in the short term, may be distorted by unusual influences impacting on the original and seasonally adjusted estimates. Trend series will be subject to revision in future issues as additional monthly original estimates become available. Users are advised to exercise caution when using the most recent trend estimates. For further information please refer to page 3 of the August 2009 issue of Australian Economic Indicators (cat. no. 1350.0).


INQUIRIES

For further information about these and related statistics, contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070 or Steve Sykes on Canberra (02) 6252 6446.