Australia trade surplus widened to AUD 4.55B in January, up from AUD 3.77B and beat expectation of AUD 2.90B. That’s also the second largest surplus on record. Exports rose 5% to AUD 1.90B while imports rose 3% to AUD 1.12B.
However, retail sales was disappointing. Sales grew merely 0.1% mom in January, rebounding from -0.4% decline in prior month, but missed expectation of 0.3% mom.
Also from Australia, AiG Performance of Construction index rose 0.7 to 43.8 in February, indicating a slower rate of contraction.
