The ABS GDP data for the June 2020 quarter may be lousy. The RBA's more timely Real-time Gross Settlement Statistics and snap view of NPP volumes for August are awful.
These RTGS numbers, an aggregation of essentially all B2B, B2C payments and government transfers along with capital markets clearing, turned down again in August.
The RTGS aggregate for the daily average value of payments was A$191 billion in August, 86 per cent of the daily values over the three months to June 2020. And the lowest level since late 2018.
One component in the RBA RTGS data previews the value of payment flows across the New Payments Platform, which is mainly consumer payments, often between family and friends.
In August, the daily value of interbank payments on the RBA's Fast Settlements Service, at $1.18 billion, fell 12 per cent from July.
Across the less troubled June 2020 quarter the household savings ratio soared to 19.8 per cent, from 6.0 per cent in the March quarter, the ABS GDP data shows.
In the June 2019 quarter the household savings ratio was 2.5 per cent. In the post-the-worst GFC days of the December 2008 quarter the savings ratio was 10.9 per cent.
The last time the savings ratio was around present levels was 1974, as the first oil-shock of that decade led Australia into what was then seen as the worst recesion since the War.
Being in the savings custody and savings recycling business, the elevated savings ratio might be one reason that the finance sector was the one and only industry called out by the ABS yesterday for generating any 'value-added' over the June quarter.
Gross value added fell 6.5 per cent in the quarter with falls in 15 of the 19 industries, the ABS said.
The three industries that produced no value-add (rather than detract) were mining, education and public administration.