Hi all, A quick note to offer guidance on the new website. As well as the layout changes that make it easier to access content for new readers, it comes with a dramatically improved sign-up and resubscription process, greatly enhanced speed, and a much better mobile experience (since 95% of traffic is now phone!). The
Its still all about the art of the deal as the Trump regime struggles to find anyone wanting to come to the table with more tit for tat accusations between China still not yet upsetting risk markets. Currencies are in a holding pattern, digesting a lot of macro events and geopolitics with tonight’s Canadian central
There goes the hope for curing all of the East Coast’s energy problems. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has praised Western Australia’s domestic gas reservation scheme and says his government already has the power to force producers to sell to the local market on the east coast. …Albanese on Tuesday sought to distance any arrangement Labor
On Tuesday, the Fair Work Commission (FWC) decided to lift the national minimum wage and award wages by 3.5% from 1 July this year. The key justification given for the decision was to provide some real wage catch-up. Business groups met the decision with their usual backlash, claiming that higher minimum and award wages would
Today’s Q1 national accounts from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) revealed that Australians lurched back into recession, with per capita GDP growth declining by 0.2% over the quarter: Per capita GDP has declined in nine of the last 11 quarters, down a total of 1.7% over that period. The overall economy also grew by
The Market Ear on the hated rally. …to start talking about all time highs? NASDAQ trading right on those huge levels. Source: LSEG Workspace Stopped in “Net leverage for the full PB book rose more than +8 pts in May, the largest monthly increase on our record, driven by large global net buying and mark-to-market“.
NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman has accused Premier Chris Minns of blaming federal tobacco taxes for the fact that the illegal tobacco trade in the state is “out of control”. Minns has suggested that cutting tobacco taxes would lead to a reduction in black market tobacco activity, leaving NSW Police with more resources to combat
It’s goodbye, Chinese steel prices. No good news. Despite the tariff reduction after the US-China trade talks in Geneva, the headline Caixin manufacturing PMI fell notably to 48.3 in May from 50.4 in April, contrary to market expectations of an uptick. Among the major sub-indexes, the output sub-index decreased the most, followed by the new
Australia recorded a tiny 0.05% rise in carbon emissions in 2024, which has the usual suspects whining. As reported by the Guardian: Emissions last year were estimated to be 446.4m tonnes of carbon dioxide, 0.2m tonnes higher than in 2023. The increase is largely due to pollution from electricity generation rising by 2.2%, reversing a
Victoria’s finances are in a dire state. Victoria’s net debt was only $22.3 billion when the Labor government presented its first state budget in 2015. It has now risen to $155.5 billion and is expected to reach $194 billion by 2028-29, according to budget projections. Victorian net debt per capita was under $3,600 in Labor’s
Assistant Minister for Productivity Andrew Leigh used a speech to the Chifley Research Centre on Tuesday to call for “thickets of regulation” to be reduced to help boost productivity. Leigh stated that there are several ways to improve productivity, including an increased focus on rewarding project delivery and measuring outcomes. He claimed that excessive bureaucracy
There is dumb. And then there is really, really stupid. Australian defence falls into the latter category. In his address to the Shangri-La Dialogue Hegseth made clear the Trump administration’s priority defence policy region is Asia. …Poland expects to spend 4.7 per cent of its GDP on defence this year. Lithuania plans to spend 5.5
Last night saw the release of the latest EU flash inflation figures which imply some building deflationary pressures while the latest US factory orders blew up to a new low, reinforcing the damage done by the Trump regime’s tariff “plan”. But reality didn’t matter to equity markets as they reacted to speculation around potential trade
Financial markets believe that the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) will deliver another three 25 bp cuts to the official cash rate (OCR) in 2025, taking the OCR to 3.10% by year end. However, the market ascribed roughly a 70% probability of the RBA cutting the OCR at its next meeting in July. Belinda Allen,
Greens leader Larissa Waters has indicated that its party room has yet to decide whether it will support the federal government’s proposed superannuation tax reforms. The Greens are set to hold the balance of power in the Senate from 1 July, so Labor will depend on their votes to pass legislation. The Greens had expressed
A lot of macro events and geopolitics hit risk markets today but was mostly absorbed outside of currencies as the USD hit a six week low on a combination of the burgeoning world wide trade war started by the Trump regime and the growing slowdown in the domestic US economy. The latest Chinese manufacturing figures
The NSW and Victorian governments are urging the Albanese government to use its large election mandate to revamp the GST system. The then Turnbull government agreed in 2016 to what has been dubbed a ‘sweetheart deal’ with Western Australia, which is slated to cost taxpayers $60 billion over 11 years. This deal set a floor
We have a terrible living standards problem owing to our immigration-led, labour market expansion economic model, which devours productivity. On the other hand, we have a technological breakthrough that is all about productivity (in theory, anyway). There are two versions of AI developing – those with global tech businesses who already have a foot in
Melbourne’s auction market has rebounded strongly, recording an average final auction clearance rate of 67% in May, the strongest result since mid-2023. As illustrated in the following chart, the bounce in Melbourne’s auction clearance rate has been accompanied by a corresponding rise in dwelling values, which increased by 0.8% in May, according to PropTrack. The
Via ANZ. ANZ-Indeed Australian Job Ads fell 1.2% m/m in May, following a downwardly revised 0.3%m/m decline in April. In trend terms, the series was down 0.6% m/m. ANZ-Indeed Australian Job Ads is now at its lowest level since March 2021, but has remained in a tight range of 114 to 117 (rounded to the
This is a good decision. The Fair Work Commission has awarded an increase of 3.5% to up 2.6 million workers on minimum award rates to allow for low-paid workers to catch up on real wage cuts suffered during the pandemic. The increase will lift the national minimum wage from $24.10 an hour, or $915.90 a
NSW Premier Chris Minns aims to alleviate Sydney’s housing crisis by expediting the supply of shoebox apartments. Minns last week accused previous governments of being “timid” due to “the NIMBY [Not In My Backyard] backlash” but argued that the conversation had changed to “opening the gates to more urban consolidation and development”. “I think Sydneysiders
I have been bullish on gold for a year or more. The Market Ear sets us up. Decision time in gold Gold is back flirting with the short term negative trend line. The bounces on the 50 day and the long term trend were once again schoolbook examples of buying dips in strong trends. A
Cotality (formerly CoreLogic) has reported a tightening in rental vacancy rates over recent months. This tightening is illustrated below by Justin Fabo from Antipodean Macro. Vacancy rates have tightened across the board and are tracking below 2% across all capital city markets. Despite the lower vacancy rates, Cotality reported a moderation of annual asking rents
It’s bloody painful, but slowly iron ore is being ground down. The PMIs were no help at all. The NBS manufacturing PMI increased from 49.0 in April to 49.5 in May. The new export order sub-index, which dropped from 51.8 in March to 49.2 in April, climbed to 49.8 in May. But, the NBS construction
The official Q1 CPI inflation print from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed that the policy-important trimmed mean inflation rate declined to 2.9% year-on-year, within the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) inflation target of 2% to 3%. RBA Governor Michele Bullock’s media appearance following last month’s 0.25% rate cut suggested that she was less
