The statements on Tuesday by the governor of the Reserve Bank, Michele Bullock, sent markets into a tizz, but even while she suggested rate cuts are now off the table, there’s no reason to think Australia’s economy needs to cool.

Usually when the Reserve Bank leaves rates on hold, little happens. But on Tuesday when the RBA monetary policy board announced the cash rates staying at 3.6%, the markets all got a bit spooked.

First off, the statement released was a rather big change from the usual. Normally investors, speculators and lowly economists pick through each sentence looking for subtle word changes and trying to work out what the RBA means. For example, last year the December changed the wording of one subheading from “The outlook remains highly uncertain” to “The outlook remains uncertain”.

Sign up: AU Breaking News email

This time round, however, there were wholesale changes to the statement. Gone were the subheadings in the November statement and the December statement was around a third shorter.

There were........

© The Guardian