Monthly job placements in resource-rich Australia continued to slide down in September, slowing for the sixth consecutive month this year, the latest ANZ Banking Group Ltd's job advertisements survey released on Monday said.

Down by 2.8 per cent to 151,482 in September from August, the total number of job advertisements was likewise a decline of 10.8 per cent from a year ago, its fastest drop since the 11.3 per cent recorded in December 2011.

The plummeting trend in job ads indicate a softening Australian labour market, ANZ head of Australian Economics and Property Research Ivan Colhoun said.

"When this last occurred, in the second half of 2011, Australian employment growth slowed," he said in a statement.

"Given the evidence of a mild contraction in labour hiring intentions across Australia, we expect the labour market to continue to soften, and for the unemployment rate to drift higher in coming months."

The culprit for the September decline was the large collapse in newspaper advertising, down by 3.7 per cent, with the majority recorded in New South Wales, Western Australia and Queensland.

ANZ Banking Group Ltd's job advertisements survey comes three days before the statistics bureau releases the official September unemployment data on Thursday.

ANZ estimate that in September, at least 5,000 net new jobs were created, but a rise in unemployment rate to 5.3 per cent from 5.1 per cent.

RELATED STORIES