State of the States

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State & territory economic performance report How are Australia’s states and territories performing? CommSec has attempted to find out by analysing eight key indicators: economic growth; retail spending; equipment investment;

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Discount airfares hit record lows

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Index of Airfares All airfares except discount fares rose in January. Domestic airfares generally rose in January with business fares up 2.9 per cent, full economy fares up 1.1 per

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Investor Signposts: Week Beginning January 16 2011

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The big picture Humans like to think that they control most things. Then along comes a natural disaster like a flood and it reinforces the fact that there are many

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Record credit card use; Surprise lift in tourism

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Migration & Tourism; Credit card lending Record lift in credit card use. The number of purchases and cash out transactions made on credit cards lifted by 13 per cent in

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Flat sharemarket poses questions for investors

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Sharemarket perspectives The CommSec ‘Mums and Dads share index’ – a way of tracking the performance of commonly-held shares – fell by 7.4 per cent in 2010, exceeding the decline

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Almost 250,000 families hit by unemployment

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Labour market statistics New figures raise questions about how tight the job market really is. As at June 2010 there were almost a quarter of a million families (244,900) where

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Investor Signposts: Week Beginning January 9 2011

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The big picture One thing we can never escape here in Australia is natural disasters. Whether it is drought, floods, bushfires, cyclones or hail storms, natural disasters are part and

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‘Noughties’ over; ‘Teens’ begins

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Look back at 2010. Look ahead at 2011. Contrary to the expectations of the gloom and doomsters, 2010 turned out to be a positive year. The global economy expanded by

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Slowest housing lending growth on record

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Private sector credit (Lending) Private sector credit rose by 0.3 per cent in November to stand 3.6 per cent higher than a year ago. Housing lending to owner-occupiers stands 7.3

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Investor Signposts: Week Beginning December 19 2010

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The big picture One of the biggest furphies in 2009 was the claim that Australia had a ‘bubble’ in the housing market. It didn’t and still doesn’t but to some

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