(Bloomberg) -- Australia ‘s economy bounced back to growth in the three months through September as household spending surged and the government maintained its support.
Gross domestic product expanded 3.3% from the second quarter, when it tumbled by 7%, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said in Sydney Wednesday. Economists had forecast a 2.5% expansion. From a year earlier, the economy shrank 3.8% versus an estimated 4.4% contraction.
The Australian dollar edged up after the report, trading at 73.87 U.S. cents at 11:34 a.m. in Sydney from 73.78 cents before the data.
The renewed expansion shows how resilient the economy was outside the southeastern state of Victoria, which was under one of the world’s toughest lockdowns for much of the period. The Reserve Bank of Australia and the government delivered significant stimulus early in the pandemic to help households and firms manage.
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