The Westpac-Melbourne Institute Leading Economic Index in Australia was unchanged on the month in February 2019, after an upwardly revised 0.1 percent gain in the previous month. Meantime, the six month annualized growth rate in the index, which indicates the likely pace of economic activity three to nine months into the future, fell to -0.56 percent from -0.37 percent in the prior month. "The signal from the index is certainly consistent with the weak momentum in the second half of 2018 revealed in the print of the December quarter national accounts," said Westpac chief economist, Bill Evans. In the second half 2018, growth momentum slowed to an annualized pace of 1 percent from a 4 percent pace in the first half of the year, he added. Leading Economic Index in Australia averaged 0 percent from 1960 until 2019, reaching an all time high of 0.54 percent in April of 1975 and a record low of -1.10 percent in December of 2008.
Leading Economic Index in Australia is expected to be 0.00 percent by the end of this quarter, according to Trading Economics global macro models and analysts expectations. Looking forward, we estimate Leading Economic Index in Australia to stand at 0.00 in 12 months time. In the long-term, the Australia Leading Economic Index is projected to trend around 0.10 percent in 2020, according to our econometric models.