Australia Retail Sales, Loans Rise, Sending Dollar to Record
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Australian retail sales rose in February and lending to businesses climbed for the first time in nine months, according to government reports that sent the nation’s currency to a record against the U.S. dollar.
Sales advanced 0.5 percent from a month earlier, when they gained 0.4 percent, the Bureau of Statistics said in Sydney today. That was the biggest increase since July and was higher than the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey of 24 economists for a 0.4 percent increase.