VIEW: CBA Rolls Forward RBA Hike Call

CBA note that "remarkably high vaccination rates and an earlier reopening of NSW and Victoria means we upgrade our forecast profile for the Australian economy." This has resulted in upward revisions to their GDP growth forecasts and downward revisions to their unemployment rate forecasts.

• They note that they have upwardly revised their "profile for underlying inflation to be 2.5% Y/Y at mid‑2022 (from 2.1% previously). That is, underlying inflation will be around the middle of the RBA's 2‑3% target range by the middle of next year."
• They "expect the RBA to taper its bond buying to $A2bn per week in February 2022 until mid‑May. " They expect "that to be the final tranche of quantitative easing."
• They also think "the RBA will exit yield curve control (YCC) in Q222 and favour the May Board meeting for that decision to be announced (the risk is that the RBA exit earlier and the November Board meeting next week is 'live' regarding a decision on the yield curve target)."
• They now expect the RBA to commence normalising the cash rate in November 2022 (from May 2023 previously).