Household Survey – Page 22 – Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) Blog

The Phony Wars – The Property Imperative Weekly 21 July 2018

Welcome to the Property Imperative weekly to 21^th July 2018, our digest of the latest finance and property news with a distinctively Australian flavour.

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Watch the video, listen to the podcast, or read the transcript.

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It’s important to look past the headlines and examine the data, because we need to see the truth beneath.

Let’s start with the housing market this week. Auction clearance rates and volumes continue to fall and Sydney recorded the lowest clearance rate the city has seen since December 2012. CoreLogic says that last week saw 1,178 homes taken to auction across the capital cities, returning a clearance rate of 52.0 per cent. Compare this with 52.6 per cent across 1,411 auctions last week and 69.4 per cent on 1,627 homes this time last year.

Melbourne’s final clearance rate came in at 56.2 per cent across 559 auctions last week, similar to the previous week when 631 auctions were held and a clearance rate of 56.1 per cent was recorded. This time last year auction volumes were higher across the city with 756 homes going under the hammer returning a clearance rate of 74.9 per cent.

Sydney’s final clearance rate dropped to 46.9 per cent last week across 408 auctions, the lowest clearance rate the city has seen since December 2012. In comparison, 552 auctions were held across Sydney over the previous week returning a clearance rate of 50.1 per cent while this time last year, 609 homes went under the hammer, returning a clearance rate of 69.2 per cent.

Across the smaller auction markets, clearance rates improved everywhere except Brisbane. In terms of volumes, Adelaide was the only city to see an increase with an additional 8 homes taken to auction over the week. Of the non-capital city markets, the Hunter region recorded a 70.6 per cent final auction clearance rate across 17 results, followed closely by Geelong where 70.4 per cent of the 27 auction results were successful.

CoreLogic says auction activity is expected to remain relatively subdued this week with 1,155 homes scheduled for auction across the combined capital cities, similar to last week. And they also reported that home prices slid further across all the centres other than Brisbane, down another 0.11% in the past week. So absolutely no indication of any improvement. Today I had the chance to visit five auctions in our area, none sold, and no-one serious made any bids at three of the events.

But this should come as no surprise, as credit is still less available than a few months ago. Indeed, around forty percent of households seeking to refinance their mortgages have been knocked back compared with just 5% a year ago. We discussed these findings as part our analysis of Household Financial Confidence, which overall was lower again – see our post “Household Financial Confidence On The Blink Again” . The June 2018 edition of the index, which draws information from our rolling household surveys, registered just 89.7, well below the 100 neutral setting and down from 90.2 last month. Debt remains a major issue, with mortgages being the front line. Households remain highly leveraged. Some households with lower Loan to Value ratios have been able to switch to other, cheaper loans. We also continue to see many households adding to their overall debt via credit cards, or other loans. The new positive credit environment which commenced 1 July 2018 will change the game ahead and credit may become harder to source for some. On the other hand, households continue to dip into their savings to maintain lifestyle and budgets. Significantly more than one third of households with an owner occupied mortgage had savings LESS than the equivalent of one month’s mortgage repayment. The other two thirds had significantly larger resources which would insulate them in a down turn, at least for a time.

CoreLogic has looked at the changes in property values by area from their peaks, with Perth showing a 28% fall alongside Darwin, Brisbane down 12.5%, Adelaide down 7.4%, Canberra down 6.8%, Sydney down 5.3% and Melbourne down 0.9%. And over the past decade, house values fell on average 27% across Mackay, in Queensland, and more than 34% across the WA outback. These are big falls, and puts the movements in Sydney and Melbourne into perspective – or perhaps provides a better view of where we are headed.

S&P Global Ratings did a job on the banks this week, saying they recently negatively revised their view of the Australian banking sector’s industry risk. Developments over the past two years in the Australian banking sector, including information coming out of hearings at the ongoing Royal Commission, highlight some weaknesses in the effectiveness of regulation in the banking sector, and the conduct, governance, and risk appetite shown by Australian banks. This is a big deal, as we discussed in our post “And Now For The Bad News, At Least For The Banks”.

In addition, The latest S&P Ratings SPIN index to May 2018, based on their portfolio of mortgage backed securities showed a further move up in defaults compared with last month, from 1.36% to 1.38%. There were rises in New South Wales of 0.02%, Queensland of 0.04% and Northern Territory up 0.52%. Significantly, the larger hikes were seen in the major bank portfolios, with the prime spin rising from 1.36% last month to 1.38% in May. There was a rise in 61-90 day past due loans, from 0.22% last time to 0.25%. While these moves are small, arrears are now as high as they were back in 2011, and interest rates are much lower today, so this highlights the risks in the system. This does not appear to be a seasonal issue either; it is more structural.

In addition, personal insolvencies were higher again, according to the Australian Financial Security Authority who released their statistics for 2017–18 and the June quarter 2018. The data reveals a sharp rise in total personal insolvencies to the highest level since the Global Financial Crisis a decade ago, with record high insolvencies reached in WA and NT, and debt agreements also hitting an all-time high. The pressure on households continues to bite.

Even the RBA minutes, out this week discussed the problem. And the latest SQM Research data on rentals also showed that Sydney vacancy rates are the highest in 13 years, at 2.8%, potentially putting more pressure on property investors in city.

We also ran some alternative mortgage scenarios this week, showing that even if incomes started to move up, to nearer 3% that’s 1% higher than now, the number of households struggling with their finances would remain well above the long term trends. We remain, as a nation, highly exposed to debt, especially if interest rates rise. You can watch our video on this analysis “Alternative Mortgage Stress Scenarios”.

Even CBA’s Gareth Aird, their Senior Economist, in a fairly bullish piece, admitted that for many households, the number one headwind that they face with respect to consumption is debt repayment. Australia has one of the most indebted household sectors globally. Debt to income ratios have risen from around 148% in mid-2012 to a record high of 190% in Q 2018. This measure includes all households regardless of whether they actually have a mortgage. For households that have a mortgage, that figure is significantly higher. It has increased steadily as interest rates have come down despite lower rates making it easier to repay debt. Basically growth in the net flow of credit (i.e. new credit less repayments) has been higher than growth in income. He says a high debt burden relative to income acts as a constraint on future household consumption growth. It means that interest payments as a share of income are higher than otherwise. And of course the principal must be paid too. This leaves households with less income that can be spent on goods and services. And it means that households have a much greater sensitivity to interest rate changes. From a demographic perspective, it is younger households feeling the debt burden most acutely. There are also about $120bn of interest only loans in aggregate that are scheduled to roll over to principle and interest (P&I) loans annually over the next three years. Borrowers shifting to P&I loans will face higher monthly loan repayments. Could not have put it better myself.

The plight of households in the current environment even reached New York in an excellent piece in the New Your Times. “Australian Housing Costs Rival New York’s, but Boom May Be Ending“. I was quoted extensively: “We are on the edge of a precipice,” said Martin North, principal analyst for Digital Finance Analytics, an independent research and advisory firm. “All of the forces that have driven the home sector and the debt sector higher in the last 20 years are all coming to a critical inflection point.” “Almost everywhere you look, you can see icebergs,” Mr. North said. Signs of stress are showing. Mr. North, the analyst from Digital Financial Analytics, estimates that of 3.5 million mortgages where the owner lives in the home, almost a third of the households have incomes close to or less than their expenditures. He predicts that at least 50,000 homeowners may default in the next 12 months.

If you want to get deep and dirty into our analysis, and the potential consequences for Australian Households, and mitigation strategies, then you might want to watch the recording of our Live Stream from last Tuesday. It’s just over the hour in length, and we have some excellent interactions in the chat room. In fact there are two versions available, the live edition, including real-time chat, and the odd technical glitch (helps to turn the sound on), or the slightly shorter version, at higher quality and tidied up, but without the chat. You can choose. We plan more live events down the track. The links are below.

The apparent bright spot this week was the latest employment data which was above market expectations. The number of people employed rose 50,900 from May to June in seasonally adjusted terms, which was well ahead of forecasts of around 16,500. And that wasn’t just a lot of new part-time jobs. Full-time employment rose by 41,200. On a year-on-year basis that represents an increase in employment of 2.8%. But even then, the number of people unemployed fell from 715,200 in May to 714,100 in June. This is explained by the participation rate – the proportion of people participating or trying to participate in the paid labour market. The participation rate rose from 65.5% in May to 65.7% in June, leaving the unemployment rate unchanged at 5.4%. The Australian labour force participation rate is actually pretty high. A useful comparison is the United States – probably the world’s most robust labour market – where the current rate is 62.9%. The key point is that if more people are going to come into the labour market when it looks better – as they have been consistently – then a continued reduction in the unemployment rate is going to require creating a whole lot more jobs. And in any case the basis for counting employed people is suspect. We discussed this in our post “And Now for The Good News”. Little sign of wages growth at the moment.

The local stock markets had a pretty good week, again, with the ASX All Ords up 0.35% on Friday to 6,377. The S&P ASX 100 was up 0.38% to 5,168, encouraged by the employment data, and the economic news from China. Westpac, the largest investment mortgage lender was up 0.67% to 29.90, but well below its 12 month highs, and CBA rose 0.68% to 75.90, but again well below prices from a year ago. The overhang from the Royal Commission, tighter funding, and higher risks explain why they are priced down.

Looking across to the US markets, the earnings season was in full flight for the week and the majority hit or beat Wall Street expectations. The Down Jones Industrial was down 0.3% to 25,058 on Friday and the S&P 500 fell a little to 2,801. The Volatility Index, the VIX was also a little lower, but remains above its level last year. The financial sector continued to perform well. Morgan Stanley led the broker-dealer reports and Goldman Sachs also topped estimates, although concerns about its succession plan hit the stock later in the day. But even so, these stocks are off their 12 month highs, and Macquarie Bank, in comparison, has been performing more strongly in our local market up 0.84% on Friday to 125.40.

On the tech-heavy NASDAQ, which fell just a little on Friday, down 0.07% to 7,820, it was a tale of two techs as a momentum stock fell short of what investors wanted and an old stalwart came through. Netflix tumbled at the start of the week after the company missed expectations on new subscribers, a key metric for the streaming company. Netflix added 5.14 million subscribers in the latest quarter, shy of analysts’ expectations for more than 6.2 million. But after the bell on Thursday, Microsoft reported second-quarter earnings that beat consensus thanks to cloud services revenue.

The prospect for the path of U.S. interest rates took an interesting turn at the end of the week. At first things seemed to jibe with market expectations that the Federal Reserve will raise rates once and possibly twice before the year is out. At his Humphey-Hawkins testimony before the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated the central bank should gradually increase interest rates.

But President Donald Trump shook some of the market’s confidence, saying on Thursday he’s “not thrilled” about the Fed hiking rates and going into more specifics on Twitter on Friday.

The tweets had little overall impact on the market forecasts for upcoming rate hikes. But they did take the legs from the dollar on Friday. The U.S. Treasury Department has long had a policy of simply stating that a strong dollar is in America’s best interest.

The yield curve continues to converge across the long and short term, and this has often been seen as an early warning of trouble ahead. This from Bloomberg.

The 30-year bond is sitting at 3.03% and the 3 Month at 1.98%. The 3 Month LIBOR rates remained above 2.3% and the 10 year benchmark is at 2.9%, just a little off its highs, and this also reflected in a lower BBSW rate in Australia, suggesting a small fall in margin pressure for the banks locally compared with a few weeks ago.

Trade-war concerns took a back seat through most of the week, but were revived on Friday and could weigh more heavily next week, despite another full earnings calendar. President Trump said in an interview on CNBC that he is ready to impose tariffs on $500 billion worth of Chinese goods to the U.S. if China does not back down on its trade policies. “I’m not doing this for politics, I’m doing this to do the right thing for our country” he said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “We have been ripped off by China for a long time.”

In fact, Moody’s highlighted that already the trade-wars is hitting base metal prices, yet is hardly mentioned. Since worries surrounding a trade war came to the fore, the base metals price index has sunk by 13.0%. The copper futures are well down from their highs a couple of months back, as is steel. This could crimp Australian GDP in the months ahead. And both Gold and Silver were weaker, suggesting that at the moment “risk” investors are preferring the US Dollar.

It’s also worth noting the Chinese Yuan slide against the US dollar and the Australian Dollar and some are suggesting that this is a sign of the Chinese Government answering the Trade wars by taking their currency lower (so reducing the cost of their goods in the local economies). The Aussie Dollar continues to drift lower against the US Dollar, and we expect this to continue, indeed one economist suggested it could end up around 60c in the months ahead.

Crude oil prices posted a second-straight weekly decline and may continue to weigh on energy stocks, as they have of late. On the New York Mercantile Exchange crude futures for September delivery rose $1.30 to settle at $70.46 a barrel Friday. Investors continue to weigh up the prospect of a global shortage in supplies, despite Saudi Arabia’s pledge to hold off flooding the market with more output. That said, crude oil prices were supported on Friday by the plunge in the dollar following Trump’s remark about the greenback and other currencies.

Bitcoin lifted a little, and continues in a less volatile mode, though well below earlier highs.

Finally, for today, another lens on the debt bomb, as featured in my recent discussions with Economist John Adams, including those on the debt bomb itself, the international debt bubble and more recently the meaning of money. We have more planned, so watch out for those, and there is also dedicated web page on the DFA blog. Again the link is below.

The McKinsey Global Institute says that since the GFCs, many large corporations around the world have shifted toward bond financing as commercial bank lending has been subdued. Today, 19 percent of total global corporate debt is in the form of bonds, nearly double the share in 2007. Annual nonfinancial corporate bond issuance has increased 2.5 times, from $800 billion in 2007 to $2 trillion in 2017. The global value of corporate bonds outstanding has increased 2.7 times since 2007 to $11.7 trillion, doubling as a share of GDP.

The average quality of blue-chip borrowers has declined. In the United States, almost 40 percent of nonfinancial corporate bonds are now rated BBB, just one notch above speculative-grade “junk bonds.” Growth in speculative-grade bonds has been particularly strong. Globally, the value of corporate high-yield bonds outstanding increased from $500 billion in 2007 to $1.9 trillion in 2017. In the coming five years, and unprecedented amount of these bonds will come due. Bond issuance by companies in China and other developing countries has soared. The value of China’s nonfinancial corporate bonds outstanding rose from $69 billion in 2007 to $2 trillion at the end of 2017, making China one of the largest bond markets in the world. Outside China, growth has been strongest in Brazil, Chile, Mexico, and Russia.

From 2018 to 2022, a record amount of bonds—between $1.6 trillion and $2.1 trillion annually—will mature. Globally, a total of $7.9 trillion of bonds will come due during those five years, based on bonds already issued. However, some bonds have maturities of less than five years and may still be issued and come due during that period. If current issuance trends continue, then as much as $10 trillion of bonds will come due over the next five years. At least $3 trillion of this total will be from US corporations, $1.7 trillion from Chinese companies, and $1.7 trillion from Western European companies.

Now overlay the rising interest rate environment, and you can see the problem. Such high leverage will cost the global economy dear, and sooner rather than later.

Mortgage Stress And Defaults – Alternative Scenarios

When we released our mortgage stress report for June 2018, we said that the number of households exposed to risks is rising, and if rates were to increase then around 1 million of households will fall into stress and some may default, up from 970,000 now.

Members held a detailed discussion of the high level of household debt in Australia, informed by a special paper prepared for this meeting. Household debt has increased by more than household income over the preceding three decades in many countries, but particularly so in Australia. Two key drivers of this trend across countries have been the decline in nominal interest rates, predominantly reflecting lower inflation, and financial deregulation, both of which have increased households’ access to finance. Members noted that a distinguishing feature of the Australian housing market is that the bulk of dwellings are owned by the household sector. This has contributed to greater borrowing for housing by households in Australia compared with other countries, where the corporate sector owns a larger proportion of rental properties. Another feature of the Australian housing market that has contributed to greater borrowing by households is the higher cost of housing in Australia on account of a larger share of the Australian population living in urban centres, typically in large detached dwellings.

Survey data indicate that much of Australian household debt is owed by higher-income and middle-aged people, who tend to have more stable employment and often larger savings buffers. However, members recognised that a material share of household debt is held by lower-income households, which generally have higher debt relative to their income. Household assets in aggregate are valued at around five times the value of household debt and total assets exceed the value of debt for most households. Members noted, however, that most household assets are housing and superannuation, and that both of these are illiquid.

Members noted that high levels of household debt could affect economic outcomes. For example, households with high debt levels are more vulnerable to economic shocks and therefore more likely to reduce consumption in the face of uncertainty about their future income. Members also noted that changes in interest rates have a larger effect on disposable income for households with high debt levels, but that these households may be less inclined to borrow more at times when interest rates fall. Accordingly, members agreed that household balance sheets continued to warrant close and careful monitoring.

In fact our research says, yes, debt is a problem, and it is hitting many different types of household, including more affluent ones.

Our analysis of stress and defaults created a stir in the media, several radio and TV interviews, and some interesting discussions on social media.

One of these, with Peter on Twitter led to a question about how we make our assessment and scenarios and our definitions of mortgage stress (cash-flow based). We include estimates of expected wages growth, inflation, cpi, interest rates etc.

So this led to a discussion where I volunteered to run a scenario using Peter’s parameters.

We also added in the tax changes and child care subsidy (in both scenarios). We do not impose a particular family structure, but capture that in our surveys (which aligns to the ABS census distribution).

So, we ran our model with a 3% wage growth, 2.1% CPI and small rise in mortgage rates. Stress levels would begin to fall, but will still be higher than since 2000, because of the greater leverage and debt burden.

Here are the results, one year down the track.

So the impact of potential wages rises, in real terms is significant. A “good outcome!” However even then the risk in the system remains higher than we have been use to. Defaults reduced by 6% while stress fell by more than 8%.

Financial Resilience – DFA Live Show

We ran a live session last night via YouTube where we discussed a range of issues across property, lending and housing finance using data from our Core Market Models. Note data in the show was current at 16th July 2018.

This stream, and the comments through the hour session is now available to watch at your leisure. Thanks to all those who took part in a wide ranging and important discussion.

Property Concerns Drives June 2018 Household Financial Confidence Lower

We have released the June 2018 edition of our household financial confidence index, which draws information from our rolling household surveys. In June the overall index fell once again to 89.7, well below the 100 neutral setting down from 90.2 last month.

Looking at the results across the states, we see further falls in New South Wales and Victoria, a small fall in Western Australia, but small rises in Queensland and South Australia.

Looking across our property segments, those who are renting or living with families or friends returned a small rise, reflecting expected tax changes and increments on some wages for the new financial year. However, those owning or investing in property were significantly less bullish (drowning out any benefit from the tax changes etc.). Property Investors are getting very nervous as prices decline, interest rates are expected to rise, and rental streams are crimped. We noted a rise in vacancy rates in a number of areas. Owner occupied (OO) households are more positive, relatively speaking, although they have dipped below the neutral setting in April.

Across the age bands, older households are more bullish, with those over 60 years and 50-60 years a little more positive on the back of the recent tax changes from 1 July 2018. On the other hand, younger households are consistently less positive, especially those who purchased property in the past couple of years. Those aged thirty to forty years are under most pressure. Those with savings in the banks remain concerned.

We can examine the drivers across the dimensions in our survey. In terms of job security there was a small rise last month, with those feeling more secure up 0.65% to 11.8%. On the other hand, those less secure also rose by 0.78% to 27.9%, with a consistent theme of limited hours being to the fore. We continue to see a rise in households managing multiple concurrent part time jobs to make ends meet.

Turning to income, there was no indication of significant income rises before the new financial year, next month may be different. 52.7% said their incomes had fallen in real terms over the past year, and 44% reported no change. Once again we see evidence of limited hours driving underemployment higher, so on a gross income there is no light at the end of the tunnel, yet.

Costs of living continue to rise with 81.3% seeing their expenditure rising, thanks to the usual suspects, including electricity, child care, school fees and health insurance costs. There were also signs of pressure from food costs and council rates. Only 2.2% reported said their costs have fallen over the past 12 months. The reported CPI rates appear to be disconnected from reality.

Debt remains a major issue, with mortgages being the front line. Households remain highly leveraged. Some households with lower Loan to Value ratios have been able to switch to other, cheaper loans, but more than 40% of households seeking to refinance have been knocked back in the past 3 months, up from 5% a year ago. A hallmark of the current lending environment. We also continue to see many households adding to their overall debt via credit cards, or other loans. The new positive credit environment which commenced 1 July 2018 will change the game ahead. Credit may become harder to source for some.

On the other hand, households continue to dip into their savings to maintain lifestyle and budgets. 46% of households are less comfortable with the level of their savings compared with a year ago. Many responses highlighted the recent collapse in bank deposit rates as ADI’s try to manage their margins. Around the same, 46% of household reported no change. Significantly more than one third of households with an owner occupied mortgage had savings LESS than the equivalent of one months mortgage repayment. The other two thirds had significantly larger resources which would insulate them in a down turn, at least for a time.

Finally, we see that more households are reporting a fall in net worth – total assets less loans and other liabilities, with 23% now saying they are worth less (up 0.95% on the month). 28% reported no change over the past year, and 46% reported growth in net worth, helped by the still significant run up in home prices in recent years (now correcting) and rises in stocks in recent months.

Generally those with more assets are still seeing rises compared with an average Australian household, highlighting the two-speed story across the country, depending on affluence.

But we also continue to see a tranche of highly leveraged high net-worth households having to cope with financial pressures as home prices and rentals move against them and the impact of switching from interest only to principal and interest loans hits home.

We would expect a small bounce in the index next month as some incomes rise in the new tax year and other changes take effect. But the impact of the fading property sector, and cash flow constraints are likely to dwarf this impact. The only “get out of jail card” will be income growth above inflation, and as yet there is little evidence of this occurring. Thus we expect the long grind to continue.

Finally, we see a number of attractor rates from the banks in an attempt to keep mortgage volumes up, but many households cannot access them in the new tighter lending environment. In addition the reduction in rates on some deposit accounts is also hitting the hip pockets of many who rely on income from them. We noted in the survey that a number of households were actively seeking alternative savings vehicles as property and bank deposits look less interesting. We will have to see whether these alternatives are as attractive (in terms of risk-return) as some are claiming. We have our doubts. But then risk is relative.

By way of background, these results are derived from our household surveys, averaged across Australia. We have 52,000 households in our sample at any one time. We include detailed questions covering various aspects of a household’s financial footprint. The index measures how households are feeling about their financial health. To calculate the index we ask questions which cover a number of different dimensions. We start by asking households how confident they are feeling about their job security, whether their real income has risen or fallen in the past year, their view on their costs of living over the same period, whether they have increased their loans and other outstanding debts including credit cards and whether they are saving more than last year. Finally we ask about their overall change in net worth over the past 12 months – by net worth we mean net assets less outstanding debts.

We will update the index next month.

Financial Resilience 101

Back in January I decided to start more regular content creation for YouTube. Last week we passed 3,000 subscribers, and the number continues to grow. Thanks for your support. And judging by your comments, you appreciate the straightforward data driven approach. Our podcast subscriber base is also expanding nicely too.

Since that time, we have built the arguments using data to highlight around the growing pressures from higher levels of debt, sliding home prices sliding and higher interest rates.

Now one question keeps recurring in the community discussion. I see the problem, but what should I do to protect myself in these uncertain times? This is an excellent question, and one I want to take further. Because the answer is, it depends.

It depends on where you believe the economy is headed. It depends whether you are seeking to protect the value of existing assets and savings, are seeking to exploit the uncertainty, or something else.

So in response, I am going to commence today the first in a series of posts which I have called Financial Resilience 101.

Resilience is defined as “the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness”.

And we start our journey with a quick recap based on some of the most relevant posts I have already created. If you missed them, now is a good time to catch up.

The first post “Four Potential Finance and Property Scenarios” discusses the range of potential outcomes over the next couple of years, because you will need to decide where to place your bets.

If you are holding to a mild correction and more of the same, you will adopt one set of strategies for resilience, whereas if you are at the other end of the spectrum and looking at global events similar to the GFC a decade ago you will go a different way. Thinking about scenarios is useful if not easy to do. We will update our scenarios again in a future post, but they generally still holding true.

The next post discussed whether now is a good time to buy property “Should I Buy”and here we explored the reasons to buy and not to buy.

Again it partly depends on your view, but also whether you are thinking of property as a place to live or an investment.

The other side of the coin is should I sell now, and we discussed this too in our post “Should I Sell Now?” and we look at the reasons why you might decide to sell, or not.

Again this varies depending on whether you are an owner occupier or a property investor.

Then we went on to explore options beyond property, accepting that things may get shaky. In our post “What Should I Do” we go through the options, from stocks, shares, bonds, commodities and crypto and draw some comparisons with the UK a decade ago via Northern Rock.

Now once you have gone through these sessions you will have a good set of foundations from which to build a Financial Resilience Strategy. Next time we will then go further into what to do next.

And a warning, this is not financial advice, as I cannot take account of individual circumstances, and am not qualified to give such advice. That said, there are some general principles which I think are useful, based on my own experience. And if you find these useful then that is a good outcome. But you will have to make your own decisions.

Two final points, first generally diversification is goodness, as it spreads the risks, and second there are no silver bullets, no simply answers. If there were, I would not be making these videos, I would be going after that solution! Neither Gold, nor Silver nor Crypto are without significant risks. You can easily jump from the frying pan into the fire. Things are decidedly tricky at the moment, so you need to do the work, and make your own choices. No silver (or other metal) bullets here!

When Will The “Debt Elastic” Ping Back? – The Property Imperative Weekly 7th July 2018

Welcome to the Property Imperative weekly to 7^th July 2018, our digest of the latest finance and property news with a distinctively Australian flavour. By the way if you value the content we produce please do consider joining our Patreon programme, where you can support our ability to continue to make great content. Here is the link.

Watch the video, listen to the podcast, or read the transcript.

This week the RBA left the cash rate on hold once again at 1.5% and continued the trend of doing nothing. In fact, reading the release from Tuesday, it is worth noting two things. First they are being very gentle in referring to home price falls, saying “Nationwide measures of housing prices are little changed over the past six months. Conditions in the Sydney and Melbourne housing markets have eased, with prices declining in both markets. Housing credit growth has declined, with investor demand having slowed noticeably. Lending standards are tighter than they were a few years ago”. Second, we think they would like to lift rates to more normal levels, but cannot thanks to high debt, and downside risks. They are stuck. I believe the next move will be down as the economy weakens (dragged down by the fading property market, rising interest rates internationally, and concerns about China’ economic dynamo). But not yet.

Now compare this with a BIS report also out this week. The BIS is worried by the current low interest rate environment, and in a new report by a committee chaired by Philip Lowe, warn of the impact on financial stability across the financial services sector, with pressures on banks via net interest margins, and on insurers and super funds. They warn that especially in competitive markets, risks rise in this scenario. Low interest rates may trigger a search for yield by banks, partly in response to declining profits, exacerbating financial vulnerabilities. In addition, keeping rates low for longer may create the need to lift rates sharper later with the risks of rising debt costs and the broader economic shock which follows. A salutatory warning! We discussed this in more detail in our post “To “Bail-In” Or To “Bail-Out”, That Is Indeed The Question”.

The contrast between the theoretical macro policy position, and the local situation here in Australia, must at very least be giving Mr Lowe a bit of a headache!

The trajectory of global rates is upwards as we will discuss later. The latest from the FED is that further rate rises are required, and expected. So the FED is doing what the BIS report suggested. But the net result is pressure on Bank funding here, remember that around 30% of bank funding comes from overseas and the BBSW is higher still.

Two points to make here. First as credit availability is the strongest influence of home prices, the easy access to international capital markets the banks have had in recent years meant they could lend more, up to 30% more, hence disastrously higher home prices. Second the weight of evidence is that more banks will lift rates. Citigroup for example, forecasts that the rising cost of funding will prompt Australia’s four major banks to increase their mortgage interest rates independently of the RBA, with the banks tipped to begin lifting their mortgage rates by an average of eight basis points by September. Citigroup adds that the rise in banks’ short-term funding costs since early 2018 is likely to be sustained. And in effect the tenor of the RBA minutes signals to the banks they can go ahead and lift rates.

As rates have fallen, households have leveraged up, supported by lose lending policy and driving home prices to massive multiples of household income as data from IFM Investors showed this week.

And even small rate rises will hurt, as we showed in our latest Mortgage Stress release for June, which was out this week. Mortgage stress continues to rise. Across Australia, more than 970,000 households are estimated to be now in mortgage stress (last month 966,000). This equates to 30.3% of owner occupied borrowing households. In addition, more than 22,000 of these are in severe stress. We estimate that more than 57,100 households risk 30-day default in the next 12 months. We expect bank portfolio losses to be around 2.8 basis points, though losses in WA are higher at 5.2 basis points. We continue to see the impact of flat wages growth, rising living costs and higher real mortgage rates. We discussed this in our post “The Debt Pips Are Squeaking”, in which we also discussed the latest anaemic retail sales figures, and the latest household debt to income ratio from the RBA which are now at a record 190.1. We are literally drowning in debt. And its structural.

The Australian Institute of Health & Welfare released a new report showing that home ownership is out of reach to growing numbers of Australians, thanks to high prices and poor affordability. They say that over the last 20 or so years Australia has seen a shift from outright ownership to owning with a mortgage, and a shift from overall home ownership to private rental Between 1995 and 2015, the proportion of outright owner-occupied households fell from 41.8% to 30.4%. Comparatively, the proportion of households owning with a mortgage has increased, from 29.6% to 37.1%, over the same period. Overall, the proportion of households in home ownership fell from 71.4% to 67.5%. There has also been an increase in the proportion of households renting privately (from 18.4% to 25.3%), and a decline in the proportion of households renting through state and territory housing programs (from 5.5% to 3.5%). Equally telling is home ownership rates between 1971 and 2016, by selected 5-year age groups. The home ownership rate of 30–34 year olds was 64%, and 50% for 25–29 year olds, in 1971. Forty-five years later these rates have decreased notably, with the home ownership rate of 30–34 year olds falling 14 percentage points to 50%. Similarly, that of 25–29 year olds fell 13 percentage points (to 37%). While declines are evident for other age groups they are much less marked. So fewer Australians are tending to own their home at retirement. For Australians nearing retirement, for example, age groups 50–54, 55–59, and 60–64, home ownership rates peaked in 1996 at 80%, 82% and 83%, respectively Since 1996 however, there has been a gradual decline in home ownership rates, most notably in the 50–54 age group which has seen a 6.6 percentage point fall over these 20 years (from 80.3% to 73.7%). This is one reason why we are watching closely our “Down Trader” segment – people seeking to sell and release capital. There are 1.2 million in this state, compared with around 600,000 up Traders, and 150,000 first time buyers. So on simple supply demand logic, more people selling than buying means prices will fall further.

And on that note, CoreLogic said that the weighted average clearance rate has tracked below 60 per cent for 8 consecutive weeks now, while over the same 8-week period last year clearance rates were tracking within the low 70 to high 60 per cent range. Last week Melbourne’s final auction clearance rate fell to 57.2 per cent across a lower volume of auctions week-on-week with 791 held, down on the 941 auctions over the week prior when a higher 59.9 per cent cleared. In Sydney, less than half of the homes taken to auction sold last week. The city returned a final auction clearance rate of 49.7 per cent, down slightly on the 50.1 per cent the previous week, with volumes across the city remaining relatively steady over the week with a total of 634 held. All of the remaining auction markets saw a lower volume of auctions last week, with the final clearance rate across each market also falling week-on-week. There were also a large number of passed in auctions.

Gerard Minack from Minack Advisors said this week that the housing market looks ‘thin’, hinting that prices may be unusually sensitive to a change in demand. Historically housing market turnover tracked price growth. However, turnover has been soft relative to price gains over the past 3-4 years, and in the March 2018 quarter turnover fell to the lowest level since the 1990 recession.

There are still many economists talking of just a small slide in prices over the next few months, but we suspect they are underestimating the impact of tighter credit. For example, Macquarie suggested from their annual mystery shopping survey mortgage power – the amount people could get when applying for a mortgage had not dropped that much at all. But in fact, it seems the non-banks, those not under so much scrutiny from APRA is where the bigger loans reside.

Whereas UBS, the arch property bears, suggest that credit tightening will continue, as lending flows ease, saying one of the key recommendations of the Royal Commission is likely to be a stricter interpretation of Responsible Lending. In particular “reasonable steps” required to verify customers’ financial positions. This is likely to require credit licensees (banks and non banks) to verify living expenses from customers’ transaction banking and credit card data over a period of around 12 months. They go to say that as ANZ stated in its submission to the Royal Commission, verifying living expenses from transaction accounts and credit cards is operationally complex and will likely require substantial investment in technology to automate this process. So UBS believes that while the major banks will be able to absorb these costs, such technological investments may be prohibitive for many of the smaller players. Therefore, they believe that any potential regulatory mismatch benefiting the smaller banks and non-banks is unlikely to be sustainable. In other words, credit will be tighter soon, driving prices lower.

The Corelogic’s Housing Index showed that prices slipped again last week in Sydney, down 0.13%, Melbourne down 0.11%, Adelaide down 0.01% and Perth down 0.07%. Brisbane rose 0.02%. On a 12 month basis, Sydney on average has dropped 4.69%, while Perth has fallen 2.08%. The other centres have risen just a little. But it is worth remembering that Sydney prices are still 66% from the last trough, Melbourne 56%, Brisbane 21% and Adelaide 19%. Perth is only 0.4% higher, thanks to the prevailing weak economic conditions in the West. This weakness also has translated into rental rates, with Perth seeing just a 3% rise over the past 10 years for houses, and a small fall for units. Compare this with a national rise in rentals over the same period of 25.7%. At the other end of spectrum rentals rose 53.8% for Hobart houses, and 44.7% for units, highlighting the housing cost pressure there.

Despite the falls in property values, and the expected future further falls, the AFR said Labor has shrugged off suggestions from the property industry that its planned changes to negative gearing rules should be scrapped because of market conditions. They reported that Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen told a Property Council of Australia forum in June the changes were about making long-term structural adjustments, rather than addressing the short-term cycle. The policy was a once in a generation reform. We think he is right.

The Royal Commission in Darwin this week heard about the thousands of Aboriginal people who are sold unsuitable financial products and vulnerable consumers are targeted by instant cash loan machines because the financial landscape supports predatory practices. Insurance agents were able to exploit and target Aboriginal people because the industry isn’t fully regulated. An excellent The Conversation Article made the point that the cultural, economic and political arrangements that allow this to happen are called “practice architectures”. They include the complex language used to deceive consumers into buying unsuitable products, incentivised high pressures sales tactics, and a lack of care and concern for vulnerable consumers. All of these aspects are within the scope of financial regulators. The funeral insurance industry can push dodgy products because no one is watching. Predatory financial practices will continue until governments and/or regulators do something about it.

More evidence of regulators not doing their job, and the financial sector simply exploiting their customers to make a quick buck.

We heard this week that ASIC has accepted court enforceable undertakings from the Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Australia and New Zealand Banking Group under which the banks have agreed to change the way they distribute superannuation products to their customers. ASIC investigated CBA’s distribution of its Essential Super product and ANZ’s distribution of its Smart Choice Super and Pension product through bank branches. ASIC found a common practice of offering those products to customers at the conclusion of a fact-finding process about customers’ overall banking arrangements. ASIC was concerned that customers may have thought, due to the proximity of the fact-finding process to the offer of Essential Super or Smart Choice Super, that the CBA branch staff or the ANZ branch staff were considering risks specific to the customer when this was not the case. These court enforceable undertakings prevent CBA from distributing Essential Super in conjunction with a Financial Health Check and ANZ from distributing Smart Choice Super in conjunction with an A-Z Review. They also require CBA and ANZ to each make a $1.25 million community benefit payment. If there is a breach of the undertaking ASIC can, under the ASIC Act, apply for orders from the court to enforce compliance. But whilst individuals risk being sent to prison as one Perth finance broker, did this week, or permanently banned from the finance industry for loan fraud, the asymmetric penalties between the small guys and the big firms is – well shameful. It seems to me regulators are going for the easy targets who cannot fight back, whilst imposing mild penalties on the big guys, for fear of court proceedings. The balance is just wrong.

Finally, looking across the markets, shares in Australia started the new financial year well, with most banking stocks going higher. Bendigo Bank was up 1.72%, Suncorp up 0.54% and even the languishing Bank of Queensland rose 0.77%. Westpac was up 0.85%, ANZ up 1.97% on its buybacks, NAB up 1.6% and CBA up 1.2%, though still below its peak in 2017 when it was above $82. So risks in the mortgage book are clearly not worrying investors that much just now. This despite the 90-Day mortgage default rates going higher as reported in the S&P Ratings SPIN Index. Macquarie, who has more business offshore than on shore rose 0.42%, at 122.96, just off its all-time highs, The ASX 200 ended higher up 0.91% to 6,272, a solid rise. The Aussie Dollar did a little better too against the US Dollar settling at 74 cents, up 0.57% and against the Chinese Yuan up 0.7% to $4.94.

Now back to global debt. Deutsche Bank published a chart which showed that of the $50 trillion global bond market, about $8 Trillion of these bonds are now trading at negative interest rates, thanks to changes in interest rates across the market. Within the $50 trillion, the amount of nonfinancial corporate bonds has increased 2.7 times over the past decade to $11.7 trillion, according to Mckinsey. Debt in China has outgrown that in the USA, based on GDP, with non-financial corporate debt in China sitting at 160% of GDP, compared with 97% in the USA, according to JP Morgan. The China credit boom, is well, booming…

This all signals more trouble ahead, given that the US 3 Month bond rate and LIBOR are sitting at highs, and the 10 Year US Bond Rate remains elevated, reflecting the expectation of more FED rate hikes ahead. And the latest from the FED is that further rate rises are required, and expected.

U.S. stocks finished the week mostly higher, thanks mainly to low-volumes of buyers on Friday. The S&P 500 finished the week up about 1.5% and the Dow ended about 0.8% higher for the week. The big winner was the tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite, which closed up about 2.4% for the week. The DOW ended the week up 0.41% to 24,456 after light holiday trading.

US employment data showed still-solid growth in payrolls, but lower-than-expected wages, which eased inflation concerns. Nonfarm payrolls rose by 213,000 in June. That was higher than the consensus estimates of 200,000. The jobless rate unexpectedly rose to 4.0% from 3.8%, missing consensus expectations for it to remain unchanged as more people entered the labor force. Average hourly earnings advanced 0.2% month-on-month in June, below expectations. The data still suggests the Federal Reserve will gradually raise interest rates. The markets are still pricing in two more rate hikes this year.

The real unknown though is the U.S, China Trade Battle which is now officially underway. The U.S. has put tariffs in place on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods and the Chinese hit right back with tariffs on $34 billion on U.S. goods going into effect. China said the U.S. had “launched the largest trade war in economic history to date.” And the U.S. administration is already looking at ramping up the amount of tariffed goods, threatening another 16 billion dollars in two weeks, and then more later. No one knows where this will lead. But there are risks for Australia and other countries getting caught in the cross-fire.

The U.S. dollar endured a tough week that was not helped by the mixed jobs numbers that offered little encouragement for traders looking for faster Fed hikes. The dollar index, which compares the greenback to a basket of six currencies, was down about 0.7% for the week. The dollar also faced pressure from the euro during the week. German Chancellor Angela Merkel resolved an immigration battle and with her interior minister that had threatened the future of her coalition government.

Oil continued higher through the week, as supply limits kicked in, up 1.33% to 73.91, and Gold fell again, down 0.23% as risks abated.

And finally, Bitcoin recovered a little to 6,615 but remains volatile, while the broader VIX index sits slightly above the lows seen last year, but below the peak of a few months back.

So it seems that investors are banking on the debt elastic not snapping back anytime soon, but we will be watching for further signs of stress given the massive amount owing out there as rates rise. Meantime banks are making hay, despite the levels of uncertainly out there. As the BIS report put it “A key takeaway is that, while a low-for-long scenario presents considerable solvency risk for insurance companies and pension funds and limited risk for banks, a snapback would alter the balance of vulnerabilities,”. We have been warned.

Before I sign off, mark your diary. On the 17^th July at 8 PM Sydney time I will be running our next live streaming session, where you can discuss in real time the issues in play. Judging by the previous session, it will be a lively event. I will schedule it shortly on our YouTube channel.

Mortgage Stress Continues To Claw Higher

Digital Finance Analytics (DFA) has released the June 2018 mortgage stress and default analysis update.

The latest RBA data on household debt to income to March reached a new high of 190.1 [1] …

… so no surprise to see mortgage stress continuing to rise. Across Australia, more than 970,000 households are estimated to be now in mortgage stress (last month 966,000). This equates to 30.3% of owner occupied borrowing households. In addition, more than 22,000 of these are in severe stress. We estimate that more than 57,100 households risk 30-day default in the next 12 months. We expect bank portfolio losses to be around 2.8 basis points, though losses in WA are higher at 5.2 basis points. We continue to see the impact of flat wages growth, rising living costs and higher real mortgage rates.

The latest S&P Ratings data shows a rise in 90 day plus delinquencies in the SPIN series for April, from the major banks. So despite the fact it only covers MBS mortgages the trend is consistent with our stress analysis!

The inevitable result of too lose lending standards and easy loans is creating an intractable problem for many households given the continued low income growth, high cost environment. This also means risks to lenders continue to rise.

Our surveys show that more households are keeping their wallets firmly in their pockets as they try to manage ever tighter cash flows. This is an economically significant issue and will be a drag anchor on future growth. The RBA’s bet on sustained household consumption looks pretty crook. Even now, household debt continues to climb to new record levels, mortgage lending is still growing at an unsustainable two to three times income. Falling home prices just adds extra picante to the problem.

We continue to see households having to cope with rising living costs – notably child care, school fees and fuel – whilst real incomes continue to fall and underemployment remains high. Households have larger mortgages, thanks to the strong rise in home prices, especially in the main eastern state centres, and now prices are slipping. While mortgage interest rates remain quite low for owner occupied borrowers, those with interest only loans or investment loans have seen significant rises. Rate pressure will only increase as higher Bank Bill Swap Rates (BBSW) will force more lenders to lift their mortgage rates, as a number of smaller players already have done.

Our analysis uses the DFA core market model which combines information from our 52,000 household surveys, public data from the RBA, ABS and APRA; and private data from lenders and aggregators. The data is current to end June 2018. We analyse household cash flow based on real incomes, outgoings and mortgage repayments, rather than using an arbitrary 30% of income.

Households are defined as “stressed” when net income (or cash flow) does not cover ongoing costs. They may or may not have access to other available assets, and some have paid ahead, but households in mild stress have little leeway in their cash flows, whereas those in severe stress are unable to meet repayments from current income. In both cases, households manage this deficit by cutting back on spending, putting more on credit cards and seeking to refinance, restructure or sell their home. Those in severe stress are more likely to be seeking hardship assistance and are often forced to sell.

Probability of default extends our mortgage stress analysis by overlaying economic indicators such as employment, future wage growth and cpi changes. Our Core Market Model also examines the potential of portfolio risk of loss in basis point and value terms. Losses are likely to be higher among more affluent households, contrary to the popular belief that affluent households are well protected.

Stress by The Numbers.

Regional analysis shows that NSW has 264,737 households in stress (264,344 last month), VIC 266,958 (271,744 last month), QLD 172,088 (164,795 last month) and WA has 129,741. The probability of default over the next 12 months rose, with around 10,953 in WA, around 10,526 in QLD, 14,207 in VIC and 15,200 in NSW.

The largest financial losses relating to bank write-offs reside in NSW ($1.3 billion) from Owner Occupied borrowers) and VIC ($927 million) from Owner Occupied Borrowers, which equates to 2.10 and 2.76 basis points respectively. Losses are likely to be highest in WA at 5.2 basis points, which equates to $761 million from Owner Occupied borrowers.

A fuller regional breakdown is set out below.

Here are the top 20 postcodes sorted by number of households in mortgage stress.

Some Important Context

The rise in mortgage stress does not occur in a vacuum. The revelations from the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry (the Commission) have highlighted deep issues in the regulatory environment that have contributed to the household debt “stress bomb”. The most significant area of law discussed by the Commission has been responsible lending. Yet most of the commentary on the regulatory framework has been superficial or poorly informed. For example, several commentators have strongly criticised the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) for not doing enough but have failed to explain what ASIC has in fact done, and what it ought to have done. Gill North, Professor of law at Deakin and a Principal of DFA suggests that” APRA (and not ASIC) should be the primary focus of regulatory criticism. APRA has failed to adequately prepare Australia for future financial system instability and its prudential supervision of home lending standards and practices over the last 5 years has been woeful”.

North has published widely on responsible lending law, standards and practices over the last 3-4 years, and continues to do so. Her latest work (which is co-authored with Therese Wilson from Griffith University) outlines and critiques the responsible lending actions taken ASIC from the beginning of 2014 until the end of June 2017. This paper will be published by the Federal Law Review, a top ranked law journal later this month.

The responsible lending study by North and Wilson found that ASIC proactively engaged with lenders, encouraged tighter lending standards, and sought or imposed severe penalties for egregious conduct. Further, ASIC strategically targeted credit products commonly acknowledged as the riskiest or most material from a borrower’s perspective, such as small amount credit contracts (commonly referred to as payday loans), interest only home loans, and car loans. North suggests “ASIC deserves commendation for these efforts but could (and should) have done more given the very high levels of household debt. The area of lending of most concern, and that ASIC should have targeted more robustly and systematically, is home mortgages (including investment and owner occupier loans).”

Reported concerns regarding actions taken by the other major regulator of the finance sector, the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA), have been muted so far. However, an upcoming paper by North and Wilson suggests APRA (rather than ASIC) should be the primary focus of criticism. This paper concludes that “APRA failed to reasonably prevent or mitigate the accumulation of major systemic risks across the financial system and its regulatory approach was light touch at best.”

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[1] RBA E2 Household Finances – Selected Ratios March 2018

The Household Asset Worm Is Turning

The RBA updated their E2 Household Finances – Selected Ratios to end March, released at the end of June. So they are yet to reflect the latest downturn in home prices and rising debt. But the trajectory is clear and should be ringing alarm bells.

First the ratio of household debt to housing assets and total assets is going up, reflecting mainly falls in property prices. The rate is accelerating, confirming that while debt is still rising, values are not. Expect more ahead.

The ratios of assets to income are falling, having been rising for year, again reflecting falls in home prices. So while incomes are flat in real terms, asset values are falling faster.

And finally, the killer, the household debt to income ratios continues higher, this despite the greater focus on lending quality, and reduced “mortgage power”. The household debt to income ratio is now at 190.1, the housing debt in income 140.1, and the owner occupied housing debt to income is 106.7. In fact this is moving up more sharply as lenders have focused on owner occupied lending.

Combined this shows the problems in the household sector. No surprise then that mortgage stress is going higher. We release the June data tomorrow.

Remember that the debt to GDP ratio is highest in Australia compared with other countries.

You Can Now Support DFA On Patreon

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