Australian Job Advertisements Fell 6.7% in June, ANZ Bank Says

July 6 (Bloomberg) -- Australian advertisements for job vacancies tumbled in June for a 14th month, adding to signs the nation’s economy is being buffeted by the global recession.

Jobs advertised in newspapers and on the Internet dropped 6.7 percent from May and 51.4 percent from a year earlier, the largest annual decline since the series began in 1998, according to an Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. report released in Melbourne today.

Falling global demand for natural resources is prompting mining companies such as BHP Billiton Ltd. to pare production and workers. Central bank Governor Glenn Stevens will leave the benchmark interest rate at a half-century low of 3 percent tomorrow to spur domestic demand, according to all 20 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News.

Today’s report “suggest that hiring intentions by Australian businesses are still weak,” said Warren Hogan, head of economics at ANZ Bank in Sydney. “Employment outcomes will be critical in determining future interest rate moves,” he said.

National vacancies advertised in newspapers and on the Internet averaged 127,346 a week last month, today’s report showed. Newspaper advertisements rose 0.9 percent to an average of 8,192 a week. Internet notices dropped 7.2 percent to 119,154, the ANZ Bank report said.

Employers probably cut 20,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate rose to 5.9 percent from 5.7 percent, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists. The government’s employment report will be released on July 9 in Sydney.