Business Outlook

Five-to-ten year forecast for business planners

Successful business planning requires analytical thinking and a detailed understanding of the economic forces shaping the Australian business environment.

Deloitte Access Economics produces a quarterly publication, Business Outlook, delivers Australia’s most sophisticated economic commentary and forecasts on the Australian business environment and economic outlook. Our insights cover a detailed assessment of the Australian national economy, 19 industry sectors, and each of the Australian States and Territories.

It provides facts, figures and forecasts on Australian and world growth prospects, Australian interest rates and exchange rates, wages and prices, exports and imports, jobs and unemployment, taxes and public sector spending.  Our Business Outlook forecasts and analysis reports on the Australian market help commercial businesses and government policy decision makers strengthen and enhance your strategic planning capacity

Armed with this critical guidance, you’ll be better positioned to make informed business, planning decisions and risk assessments, and take advantage of emerging economic trends.

Key Benefits

Expert analysis to help you understand how changes can impact strategic planning and investment decisions for the Australian economic outlook.

• Ten-year detailed forecast data to support detailed financial forecasts in your own business
• Insight into Australian and world economic growth prospects, enabling you to strengthen and enhance risk assessment around key business decisions.

Summary of our Business Outlook January 2025 press release

Testing Australia’s economic resilience

Releasing the December 2024 edition of the flagship  Business Outlook, Deloitte Access Economics Partner and report co-author, Cathryn Lee, “After a sluggish 2024, Australia’s economy looks as though it may be past the low point for this economic cycle, with the combination of a strong labour market, falling inflation, tax cuts, emerging real wage gains and imminent interest rate cuts contributing to a better-than-expected outlook in 2025.

“However, ‘better-than-expected’ is not the same as ‘good’, as has been revealed by escalating business insolvencies, considerable mortgage stress and a deep per capita recession. Indeed, nobody should get overly excited or complacent. The reality is that the Australian economy remains beset by challenges.

“Real wages are now grinding higher, but it is likely to be 2030 before Australian workers recover their pre-pandemic purchasing power. Dwelling construction activity is unlikely to get any worse, but Australia’s housing crisis is likely to persist. And while business investment was a key feature of the economic recovery after the pandemic, it has since faded.”/

Deloitte Access Economics Partner and report lead author Stephen Smith said: “The outlook for 2025 could be seen as a kind of economic Rorschach test – the interpretation depends on an individual’s perspective, something that will become increasingly obvious as we move towards the first Reserve Bank meeting of the year in February and onwards towards the federal election.

“Take the Reserve Bank. As the December quarter Consumer Price Index (CPI) data will likely show, underlying inflation is moving sustainably towards the target range of 2-3%. That trend, plus the fact that Australia has been in a per capita recession for over a year, with an economy growing at its slowest rate since the 1990s, outside of the pandemic, should open the door for an interest rate cut.

“Yet, the surprisingly resilient labour market, elevated government spending, and a falling Australian dollar is complicating the Reserve Bank’s decision. While the conditions for a rate cut are now real, a cautious Reserve Bank may well hold off until more information on the domestic economy and the rapidly changing global context is available, before cutting the cash rate.

“Deloitte Access Economics expects the Reserve Bank to cut the cash rate by a total of 75 basis points through the 2025 calendar year, followed by a further 75 basis points in 2026. By the end of the rate cutting cycle, a household with an average sized mortgage and a variable mortgage rate would be around $8,000 better off in today’s dollars."

Read the full press report release - January 2025

Pricing

Annual Subscription (4 reports)

• Business Outlook Report with Data Files - $3,499 Buy
• Business Outlook Report Only - $2,499 Buy

One-off purchase - (Access to the latest release only)

• Business Outlook Report with Data Files - $1,749 Buy
• Business Outlook Report Only - $1,249 Buy

For further information (publications):
T: +61 3 9667 5070
E: daesubscriptions@deloitte.com.au

Sign up to the free Weekly Economic Briefing newsletter.