Educational resource · real historical figures from primary sources, general information not advice
Cost of Cash · History
Educational resource

Twenty years of the cash rate, and the moments that moved it

The bold line is the real Reserve Bank of Australia cash rate from 2006 to 2026, from the mining boom and the global financial crisis to the pandemic floor and the whipsaw since. Click any marked moment to see what happened and how the eight forces stood. General information, not advice.

0% 1% 2% 3% 4% 5% 6% 7% 8% 9% 10% 0.70 0.90 1.10 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 parity Cycle high 7.25%2008, pre-GFC Record low 0.10%Nov 2020
Cash rate Standard variable rate, advertised Variable home loan, paid Fixed home loan (new, up to 3 yr) BBSW 3 month AUD/USD, US dollars per Australian dollar (right axis)
Tip: switch to the Broker or CFO view to lay the loan and funding lines under the cash rate. The standard variable rate, the advertised headline, runs the full twenty years; the actual paid lines begin mid 2019, when the RBA's consistent series starts. The gap between them is the discount almost every borrower negotiates.

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Sources and method

Every rate and reading on this page is a real published figure, monthly from 2006 to 2026, drawn from the primary sources below. Nothing is invented. The only thing worked out here is the set of force bars inside each moment, and the method for those is set out further down.

The lines

Cash rate
RBA, cash rate target
Standard variable rate, advertised
RBA table F5, banks standard variable owner-occupier. The advertised reference rate, which sits above what most borrowers pay after negotiating a discount. Runs the full twenty years.
Variable home loan, paid
RBA table F6, outstanding owner-occupier variable, all institutions. What borrowers actually pay, on average. Begins mid 2019.
Fixed home loan
RBA table F6, new owner-occupier fixed up to 3 years. Begins mid 2019.
BBSW 3 month
Bank bill rate, RBA and US Federal Reserve data
AUD/USD
US Federal Reserve data and RBA, US dollars per Australian dollar

The eight forces

Inflation, trimmed mean
ABS Consumer Price Index and RBA table G1
Jobs
ABS Labour Force, unemployment rate
Growth
ABS National Accounts, real GDP quarter on quarter
Global shocks
Brent crude oil price, US EIA and Federal Reserve data
Bond yields
RBA and Federal Reserve data, 10 year government bond
Confidence
Westpac Melbourne Institute sentiment, licensed, shown by direction only
Government debt
AOFM and the Federal Budget, face value of government securities on issue

How the bars are worked out

Each force is turned into a lean by the machine's published weight table: inflation 0.90, trimmed mean 0.70, jobs 0.60, growth 0.50, global shocks 0.45, confidence 0.40, bond yields 0.35. Each reading is measured against a plain neutral point, the inflation target midpoint for prices, around full employment for jobs, and so on, then scaled by that weight, so a bar shows which way and how hard the force was pushing the cost of cash. It is deterministic: the same readings always give the same bars, and the direction matches how the live machine reads each force today.

Three honest caveats. The standard variable rate is the advertised headline, not what most people pay, so it runs above the actual paid line, which begins in mid 2019 when the RBA's consistent series starts. Confidence is shown by direction only because the index is licensed. Government debt is the open question the machine does not score, shown only for context. This is history, not a forecast.

The machine is a teaching model of the forces behind the cost of cash. A morning brief follows the real figures each day.

A daily signal to sharpen judgement, for professionals who act, not react.

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