New capital expenditure rises 0.4 per cent
New Capital Expenditure rises 0.4 per cent
Private new capital expenditure (capex) rose 0.4 per cent in the December quarter to be 7.8 per cent higher than the December quarter last year (seasonally adjusted, chain volume measures), according to figures released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Tom Lay, ABS head of business statistics, said: ‘The lift in investment was the result of strength in buildings and structures, particularly renewable energy projects.
‘This was offset by a fall in equipment and machinery, following the record high investment from data centres in the previous quarter’
Business investment rose 0.8 per cent in the non-mining industries, while the mining industry fell 0.8 per cent.
Capex was up 2.3 per cent for buildings and structures, with non-mining industries up 3.7 per cent. This was partially offset by a fall in mining, which was down 0.2 per cent.
‘Growth in buildings and structures was driven by spending on large projects in the Electricity, Gas, Water & Waste, Rental, Hiring & Real Estate, and Information Media & Telecommunications industries,’ Mr Lay said.
‘Business investment in battery energy storage systems featured strongly this quarter. Spend on wind and solar developments also remained at an elevated level.’
‘Strength was also seen from data centre construction, despite the fall in equipment and machinery.’
New equipment and machinery investment fell 1.7 per cent. Information Media & Telecommunications led the weakness in equipment, down 30.1 per cent.
‘The drop in new equipment and machinery was driven by an easing in data centre spend this quarter, although equipment investment in the Information Media & Telecommunications industry remains at an elevated level, up 49.6 per cent from last year’ Mr Lay said.
Given the recent rises in data centre investment, the ABS has published an article which details how the construction and operations of data centres appear within the suite of ABS economic statistics.
The largest rises for states and territories were in Western Australia (+3.9 per cent), Victoria (+2.0 per cent), and South Australia (+4.8 per cent).
This release includes the fifth estimate for planned capex in 2025-26. Businesses revised their expected capex for 2025-26 to be up by 4.3 per cent since their last estimate.
This release also publishes the first estimate for planned capex in 2026-27, which was up 7.3 per cent on the first estimate for 2025-26.
More detailed industry and state analysis and further information on the statistical methodology is available in New Capital Expenditure (cat no. 5625.0).
The ABS gratefully acknowledges the contributions of businesses across Australia in providing data for this release.
Media notes
- New capital expenditure refers to the acquisition of new tangible assets and includes major improvements, alterations, and additions.
- All statistical figures in this media release are in seasonally adjusted volume terms unless otherwise noted.
- Seasonal adjustment is the process of estimating and removing seasonal effects to allow comparison of data for adjacent months. See methodology for more details.
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