Summary: Household sentiment improves for second consecutive month; “remains at deeply pessimistic levels”; main drags on sentiment “surging cost of living”, “sharply higher interest rates”; four of five sub-indices higher; fewer respondents expecting higher jobless rate. After a lengthy divergence between measures of consumer sentiment and business confidence in Australia which began in 2014, confidence readings of the two sectors converged again in mid-July 2018. Both measures then deteriorated gradually...