Annual Change in Mortgage Lending Turns Negative

Économiste Monétaire

The CB monthly stats show an annual fall of -0.1% in (adjusted) residential mortgage lending. The credit card repayment numbers are also quite interesting, with outstanding indebtedness falling for the first time, y-o-y.



M3:


Some other stats released earlier this month, if anyone missed them.






Have a prosperous New Year .

Victor

Économiste Monétaire wrote: »

The CB monthly stats show an annual fall of -0.1% in (adjusted) residential mortgage lending. The credit card repayment numbers are also quite interesting, with outstanding indebtedness falling for the first time, y-o-y.



Have a prosperous New Year .

I have to run, but would the total new mortgages be a better / more telling indicator? Of course, relying on only one indicator is dangerous.

HNY!

Économiste Monétaire

Do you mean volumes of new loans (i.e. X EUR millions lent out) or the number of new loans (i.e. 3000 new mortgages approved)? Volumes of new business are in the document, but not the number of new loans approved. Sure, there are issues with new loans being approved for houses that have fallen in value, and so the figure will naturally be lower, but the latest loan approval numbers that I'm aware of are for Q2 2009 and the number given includes refinancing—that figure is down by over 50% y-o-y. I suppose you could take the volumes of new business figure and adjust it for one of the house prices indices.

You're correct, though; it's certainly not a perfect measure, it just ties in with a theme of de-leveraging.

Flamed Diving

ÉconomisteMonétaire wrote: »

So, retail sales (excl motors) have been steadily declining since Feb 09, yet retail sales (incl) motors have been performing well (95% of 2005), after a crash. That's weird.

nesf

Flamed Diving wrote: »

So, retail sales (excl motors) have been steadily declining since Feb 09, yet retail sales (incl) motors have been performing well (95% of 2005), after a crash. That's weird.

Opposite way around I think.

Flamed Diving

nesf wrote: »

Opposite way around I think.

The broken line is minus motor sales, right?

Victor

Half of the drop in outstanding loans is because of bad debt provisions, so it isn't as if borrowers are being particularly thrifty.

Flamed Diving wrote: »

The broken line is minus motor sales, right?

Correct. So non-motor sales declined gradually over the year, motor sales fell through the floor, but recovered slightly.

Flamed Diving

Victor wrote: »

Half of the drop in outstanding loans is because of bad debt provisions, so it isn't as if borrowers are being particularly thrifty. Correct. So non-motor sales declined gradually over the year, motor sales fell through the floor, but recovered slightly.

Well one has gained ten points, while the other has lost ten points. Are people buying less retail goods, but instead are purchasing new cars? The trends are confusing.

silverharp

Victor wrote: »

Half of the drop in outstanding loans is because of bad debt provisions, so it isn't as if borrowers are being particularly thrifty.

When I was conducting one of my "watercooler surveys" at work only one of about 8 people had started overpaying their mortages after taking advantage of rate cuts.

Victor

Flamed Diving wrote: »

Well one has gained ten points, while the other has lost ten points.

If you are saying "one has gained ten points, while the other has lost ten points since January" then sure, but that would be completely ignoring January, the most important month of the year for car sales.

Flamed Diving wrote: »

Are people buying less retail goods, but instead are purchasing new cars?

There is no straight answer to that unless you define the time period.

Year-on-year, from January 2008 to January 2009 car sales were down a lot (with an added suggestion that people were buying slightly cheaper cars - value is down (33%) more than volume (31%)) while retail sales as a whole were down 10% on volume, but 13% by value.

Year-on-year, from October 2008 to October 2009 car sales were down a lot (with an added suggestion that people were buying cheaper cars - value is down (15%) more than volume (10%)) while retail sales as a whole were down 7% on volume, but 13% by value.

Flamed Diving wrote: »

The trends are confusing.

Not quite, the trends are different to one another.

nesf

Flamed Diving wrote: »

Well one has gained ten points, while the other has lost ten points. Are people buying less retail goods, but instead are purchasing new cars? The trends are confusing.

Ah, I get what you mean. Well, the trend isn't that weird given the enormous drop at the start of 09 just that car sales (being luxury items) followed a different path to the broader index that contains a lot of "essentials" when it excludes the motor trade.

Flamed Diving

Victor, I suggest you go back and read my posts properly, because, quite frankly, you are beginning to irritate me.

Flamed Diving

nesf wrote: »

Ah, I get what you mean. Well, the trend isn't that weird given the enormous drop at the start of 09 just that car sales (being luxury items) followed a different path to the broader index that contains a lot of "essentials" when it excludes the motor trade.

Yup, so now the trend (Feb-Oct) is increasing purchases of luxury goods and decreasing essentials? I am suddenly saddened by the image of a child in the back seat of a 09 SLK Merc, wearing a newspaper for a diaper.

Économiste Monétaire

Today's Exchequer returns:



€24.64bn Exchequer deficit for the year, which is double the previous year's deficit. We didn't reach the pessimistic number of €30bn, though . The interest paid on the national debt is up from €1.54bn to €2.55bn.

PhiliousPhogg

Feast your eyes on this graph (interactive graph so cannot post).
http://www.statusireland.com/statistics/finacial-statistics-for-ireland/39/Government-Exchequer-Surplus---Deficit.html

In figures:
Exchequer Surplus/(-Deficit) over the last decade:
2001: 650m
2002: 95m
2003: -980m
2004: 33m
2005: -499m
2006: 2,265m
2007: -1,169m
2008: -12,714m
2009: -24,641m

Stats on overall gov debt from Dept of Finance report:
General Government Debt
· Ireland's ratio of General Government Debt to GDP at end-2007 is estimated to have been 25.1%
· Ireland's ratio of General Government Debt to GDP at end-2008 is estimated to have been 44.1%.
· The revised forecast for General Government Debt to GDP ratio at end-2009 is projected to be in the
region of 64%.