‘Real’ job numbers are good news for pay rises
What’s really happening in the jobs market? The right answer is critical to just about everything financial in your lives.
Terry McCrann
Stampede to power disaster accelerating
The rush to close Australia’s coal-fired power stations and replace them with a hopeless grab-bag of functionally useless wind and solar plus batteries is just mindless insanity.
Rising costs threaten Australia’s sweet spot
Sections of corporate Australia have been in something of a sweet spot with inflation accelerating but that looks like coming to an end as costs rise.
BHP can spend $20bn but will it spend it well?
Having finally gotten rid of all the Billiton detritus, let’s hope that BHP is not about to repeat the exercise in a spurious chase after ‘alternative energy’ assets.
What Packer will do with his $3bn
When James Packer gets his cheque for $3bn-plus his investment focus will most likely be in some area of tech because it will reward the same skillset that took him so successfully into gaming.
Big end of town wins in cartel case collapse
Everyone from the ANZ down should have been well and truly hauled over the regulatory coals, but alleging ‘cartel’ was a bizarre way to try to do that.
Why the banks will hike rates before the RBA
Australia’s big four banks are pretty much a carbon copy of each other and they are all likely to start lifting variable interest rates before the RBA moves.
How free money makes a stunning CBA profit
It wasn’t hard for the CBA to make a ‘stunning’ $4.75bn interim profit given the billions of dollars of free money it was getting from the RBA and could lend out at 2 per cent or more.
Will Magellan go back to a 2008 future?
Magellan Financial has replaced superstar ‘rainmaker’ Hamish Douglass with Chris Mackay who could potentially deliver the fund manager the type of success it had during the GFC.
Will Morrison make it to May and 12th spot?
Scott Morrison needs to stay in office until May 23 to become Australia’s 12th longest-serving PM, but there’s no guarantee he will even make it to the election.
Meta’s fall the shape of things to come
The jaw-dropping plunge in the share price of Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta is an ominous pointer to the spectacular volatility the share market faces through a turbulent 2022.
RBA should keep options open for March rate rise
Looking at the RBA’s latest forecasts, they are almost an economist’s definition of a best of all possible (fantasy) worlds.
Meta’s mega plunge great and ominous news
The 20 per cent plunge in the share price of Facebook owner Meta is good news and might be an encouraging pointer to what lies ahead for the over-bloated tech sector.
Why bank deposit rates might rise from zero
Good news for everyone with cash in the bank. Deposit rates for savers may go up if banks are forced back into the offshore market for funding this year.
Lowe to Morrison: Relax, no election campaign rate hike
PM Scott Morrison can rest easy, RBA governor Philip Lowe has effectively ruled out a rate hike in the middle of the coming federal election campaign.
Paatsch and Patrick nail Frydenberg’s failure
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s proposed $11m fines for so-called ‘proxy advisors’ if they step out of line are not just offensive but also embarrassingly stupid.
Be afraid: The Fed confirms it’s gutless
The US Fed Reserve is a disgrace and should have “surprised” the greediest people on the planet this week by hiking interest rates by 0.5 per cent.
The Big Australian comes home on Australia Day
The country’s biggest company BHP has come home to Australia but it faces some challenges such as its near total reliance on iron ore and China.
RBA must open the door to a March rate rise
Clearly accelerating inflation levels must force the Reserve Bank to bring forward interest rate rises into the first half of the year.
The momentous Australia Day straddle
Australian inflation data and the outcome of the Fed Reserve policy meeting in the US have the potential to dramatically shake up the economic outlook this week.
All eyes on interest rates in 2022
Outside of Covid the big talking point next year will be about whether interest rates go up, and if so how quickly and by how much?
Four big pointers to your 2022 future
The Wall St party underwriting global share markets continues for now but it will end very badly because US Federal Reserve head Jerome Powell has not done his job.
Westpac investors vote mostly ‘no’ to stupidity
Westpac was all-but inviting shareholders to have a free lash at the board, yet only 30 per cent took up the ‘offer’. The majority voted sensibly and with enlightened self-interest.
It’s a lawyer! New competition boss named
Gina Cass-Gottlieb will become the fifth lawyer to lead Australia’s competition watchdog and she’s go outstanding real-world qualifications for the job.
Living with Covid: The rest of our lives starts now
If Australia is going to start ‘living with’ the virus and vaccines it must really open up all of its borders and eliminate the threat of slamming them shut and going into lockdown.
The $60bn prize at end of the lockdown tunnel
A lot needs to go right to get us out of this economic mess but the rewards could be significant.
Foxtel builds off content and eyeballs
CEO Patrick Delany has detailed a future for Foxtel that is all about content, customisation, mobility and flexibility, built around a broadcast core.
Why now is the right time to bury JobKeeper 2.3
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s decision to end JobKeeper 2.3 is fundamentally necessary to drive a return to economic, business and fiscal normality across the country.
Merkel’s burst bubble delivers downunder message
Angela Merkel’s recent electoral performance provides a warning and big opportunity for Australia’s Liberal and National parties.
Premier Dan owes apologies to 6.6m plus one
Daniel Andrews owes a personal apology to his NSW counterpart and a public apology to every single Victorian over his brutal, unnecessary and ineffective lockdowns.
How John Elliott turned one cent into millions
A little known share scheme used by 80s entrepreneur John Elliot made both him and his top executives dazzling rich.
How John Elliott became a business buccaneer
He strode the national stage as a colossus in the mid 1980s, and like others of his time was unique in style, chutzpah, and – to be blunt – degree and type of criminality.
Why our market and Wall St loved the Fed
At its latest meeting the US Federal Reserve made no changes but chairman Jerome Powell did suggest rates could rise next year and it could start to taper its bond buying in November.
China saves Evergrande, Fed to keep pumping cash
With Evergrande saved and the US Fed to keep pumping out the cash it’s as if Beijing and Washington have joined hands across the Pacific to keep the party going.
China’s fake numbers hide a bigger mystery
It is impossible to know what is happening with China’s Covid numbers, just like we will never know the truth behind the country’s utterly insolvent property developer Evergrande.
Unbelievable: Australia to pass China on Covid cases
The number of cases in Australia is set to overtake China, which shows you cannot trust a single figure that comes out of Beijing.
Only certainty in Dan’s roadmap is despair
Businesses finally have certainty after Victoria’s lockdown exit plan was released — but it’s not a roadmap to freedom.
Victorian and NSW roadmaps key to economic recovery
The very best case outlook it that Victoria and NSW could set us up for a surging Christmas-New Year retail spend that kicks 2022 off in relatively strong fashion across Australia.
Why we should build nuclear power plants
Now that Australia’s submarine program has gone nuclear, will we accept the logic of also buying and building 21st century nuclear power stations?
The OECD ‘advice’ the PM didn’t want
The $1m-plus of taxpayer money spent on getting Mathias Cormann the top job at the Paris-based OECD will have no benefit for Australia.
How $55M could leave a CEO feeling underpaid
Andrew Mackenzie only pocketed $55m for his six-and-half year stint at the helm of BHP while his successor Mike Henry has already notched up $28m for 18 months in the top job.
Sydney Airport bidders in $24bn race with vaccines
Sydney Airport bidders want the deal wrapped up before stockholders develop the belief that the country’s largest gateway might return to a post-vaccine future of growth and lush profits.
Inflation has reached boiling point
This time the financial shock is going to be worse than anything we’ve experienced before, because we’ve all been feasting on the free money fantasy.
NSW exit plan buries national plan
Premier Gladys Berejiklian’s roadmap to ease Covid restrictions in NSW means there is now zero chance of any uniform national plan to reopen the country.
Grim jobless reality of Covid recession 2.0
We are currently living through Covid Recession 2.0 and it is up to the premiers whether it will continue into the December quarter.
RBA looks through lockdowns and hysteria
We either have to move into a “post-Covid” reality or cling to the fantasy that we can “solve everything” by having lockdowns and never-ending massive government spending and money printing.
Australia also must have its ‘Freedom Day’
At some point Prime Minister Scott Morrison is going to have to declare our own downunder ‘Freedom Day’, but it will be a very different one from the UK’s.
The magic numbers making the rich even richer
What happens to US jobs is seen as the best indicator of whether the money bowl will be taken away.
Do we face recession and an iron ore plunge?
With serious recessions in Victoria and NSW, we could be in for an interesting time if history repeats itself and commodity prices plunge.
Earth to idiots: We are in recession
Forget the latest growth figures, the whole country is in recession right now as businesses go bust and people lose jobs.
Original URL: https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/business/terry-mccrann/page/10