At a time when many are negative about the retail sector, well known and respected financial commenter Peter Switzer is supporting the opposite view, with the release of strong retail figures in November.

Online and in-store sales grew by 1.2% in November, following a 0.5% increase in October, the best result in 4.5 years. All states and territories in the country recorded a gain.

After the initial shock of Amazon entering the market, Harvey Norman’s share price dropped to $3.65 in early November, only to recover with a 20%+ gain to $4.43.  

More positive economic statistics of late include:

•  Job vacancies – Strongest yearly growth rate in 7 years up 16.1%, with the three months to November recording a 2.7% rise to 210,300 vacancies.
•  Council approvals for new homes – Had the strongest monthly gain a year, growing by 11.7% in November, after a drop of 0.1% in October. 
• ANZ/Roy Morgan consumer confidence – Last week saw growth of 4.7% to 122 which is a four-year high and substantially ahead of the long-range monthly average of 112.9.
•  New vehicle sales – Up 0.9% on a year ago with a record high of 1,189,116 units in 2017 (Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries). 
•   Occupied domestic flights – Occupied seats say the best result in 6 years, up to 79%. The Sydney-Melbourne load factor also saw record highs.
•  International passenger traffic – Saw total passenger numbers record 3.37 million in October, a 4.5% increase for the previous 12 months.  
•  Job advertisements – up 10.8% to the year in December. 

With the new year comes some good news for economic growth in Queensland, reports St George Bank in their December Economic Outlook report. 

Commercial construction has strengthened, business investment has gained momentum, growth in employment has been strong over the previous year, and population growth is picking up. 

Key points

Gross State Product (GSP) – while growth was evident in the 2016-17 financial year (1.8%), it was less than the previous year (2015-16 – 2.6%) due to such things the Cyclone Debbie the previous year, drop in mining investment and the slowdown of construction in housing. With that said, St George predict export volumes will push growth of 2.9% in 2017-18, and then a 3.2% increase in 2018-19.

State final demand to the year September 2017 saw a rise of 2.7%, an improvement on the 1.4% growth recorded in September 2016. (See below for explanation of 'state final demand')

Economic activity in the September quarter was restrained with household consumption remaining unchanged, and government investment detracting from growth.

Mining investment – In the last year, three LNG major mining investment projects wrapped up and the industry is now in a new phase of the cycle. Prices for coking coal has rebounded since the lows of US$73 a tone in late 2015, sitting currently at around US$236 a tonne.

Engineering construction has shown it peaked in 2013 and value of work has slid sharply since that period. That said, the two latest quarters have shown some good increases in QLD with an increase on 9.5% increase in the year to the September quarter.

Business Investment – in QLD, for the year ending the September quarter, a rise of 7.9% was recorded. QLD has recorded a rise for three consecutive quarters.

Commercial construction in QLD has continued to flourish due to thriving tourism, especially the international sector.

Population growth in QLD has shown a growth rate of 1.6% for the year to the March quarter.

The QLD labour market is showing improvement with annual employment growth up 4% to the year ending November 2017 (national long term average is 2.3%, and annual national growth is 3.2% to the year ending November 2017).

Note: "State final demand measures the total value of goods and services that are sold in a state to buyers who wish to either consume them or retain them in the form of capital assets. It excludes sales made to buyers who use them as inputs to a production activity, export sales and sales that lead to accumulation of inventories." (ABS)

The latest international tourism statistics to the year ending September 2017 show an impressive 2.5% increase in expenditure by international visitors to a staggering $5.3 billion reports Tourism and Events Queensland.

Total visitors saw an increase of 3% to a total of 2.6 million. Each of the 11 tourism regions in Queensland recorded growth in holiday visitation, while Brisbane hit record high numbers with a 4.6% increase to 1.237 million visitors.

Markets by expenditure

International visitation by region

With regards to purpose of visit; holiday was the leading reason with 1,831,000 (up 2.9%), followed by visiting of family and relatives with 630,000 (up 7.7%), 177,000 for business (up 7.1%), and 115,000 for education (up 18.1%).

Brisbane has rated highly in the prestigious ‘Global Cities of the Future’ accolades, reports choosebrisbane.com.au.

The report is released every two years by London-based fDi Intelligence.

In an excellent result, Brisbane ranked fourth out of 53 entries in the Foreign Direct Investment category, and tenth out of 131 entries in the Human Capital and Lifestyle category.

Brisbane Lord Mayor Graham Quirk said “Placing fourth for foreign direct investment strategy demonstrates that Brisbane is successfully showing the world that our city is economically resilient, supports foreign investors across a range of industry sectors, and is backed by a robust and connected business and government environment.”

“To be ranked within the top 10 globally for human capital and lifestyle is testament to the outstanding education, research, business, employment and lifestyle opportunities that continue to attract and retain talented and skilled people in our great city.”

Brisbane Marketing, which is the city’s economic development board played a role in receiving two inaugural awards for strategy.

The Brisbane 2022 New World City Action Plan was awarded with the Strategic Vision Award, and the Tourism Development Award was won by the city’s hotel investment strategy and tourism infrastructure.

Mr Quirk said “More than $10 billion worth of major project and infrastructure work in the pipeline will support greater numbers of tourists who are choosing our progressive and multicultural city for the wealth of unique experiences on offer.”

“The latest fDi Intelligence rankings are another indicator that Brisbane is becoming a more globally competitive city which will continue to attract and benefit from foreign direct investment.”

An investigation by CBRE Research indicates an economic boom for Queensland may be just around the corner, reports brisbanedevelopment.com.

The report finds interstate migration due to housing affordability between Sydney and Brisbane, and white-collar employment growth are the main drivers.

Interestingly, in 2002, at the time that average house prices in Brisbane were 43% of those in Sydney, interstate migration peaked at 40,000 people per year. Fast forward 15 years to 2017, the 43% is once again the figure, and interstate migration is again increasing, and continues to rise at pre-GFC levels.

Brisbane inner-city apartments are becoming more appealing to millennials due to price, location to public transport and lifestyle precincts.  

With regards to jobs, Queensland was the second largest contributor to growth in Australia in 2016. With regards to private sector confidence, NAB’s Monthly Business Survey shows that Queensland consistently outperforms the national average.  

An estimated $30 billion worth of investment projects are currently underway across South-East Queensland. The top ten projects which are underway are:

Tourism is set to benefit greatly from the Queens Wharf development, forecasted to generate 1.39 milliom additional visitors to Brisbane annually. The new runway at Brisbane Airport which will help to cater for this influx, will have the same capacity as Singapore and Hong Kong airports. A new privately funded mega cruise ship terminal at the Port of Brisbane is expected to bring an additional 800,000 tourists per year which is predicted to triple the industry in the next two years.

The major projects that have already commenced and are in the pipeline will no doubt create a flurry of employment activity over the coming years.