Victoria’s disaster points to Australia’s
The Victorian state budget is an instructive – and ominous – pointer to the bigger one out of Canberra next week.
Terry McCrann
Jobs, inflation key to next rate move
Michele Bullock is keeping her cards close to her chest ahead of key inflation data which will decide the RBA’s next move.
Bonza reality check: Qantas-ACCC stoush ancient history
Bonza’s failure was a reality check for Qantas and it’s time to move on from its stoush with the ACCC.
Powell’s re-pivot a lesson for central bankers
Jerome Powell has shown why central bankers should get out of the business of interest rate forecasting, and focus more on ‘doing’ and less on ‘saying’.
Be afraid, be very afraid
Jim Chalmers’ speech on Wednesday revealed the sort of insane dystopian future that will be built if the treasurer and his colleagues aren’t stopped.
There is no way rates are moving – either way
There is no way that Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock would lead her board to raise the official cash interest rate with the current abysmal levels of consumer spending.
The headache facing central banks
Central banks in the US and Australia have a fair bit to think about over Easter as they contemplate the question on everyone’s minds – will the rate cuts come?
Why rate override power must go
The one proposed change to the RBA that should be entirely uncontroversial is the ending of the government’s ability to overrule an interest rate decision.
Billionaire believes in real shops
Billionaire Solomon Lew is determined to show there is still life in retail and that much if not indeed most of that future life will still be in real actual bricks and mortar stores.
Treasurer goes to war with the RBA
The Labor Government’s push for a 4 per cent minimum wage increase has effectively set it against RBA governor Michele Bullock’s desire for a wage moderation and productivity increases.
Six earth-shaking hours
The US Fed’s ‘dot points’, supposedly predicting rate cuts, stirred up the markets bigtime. But they’re well known for their inability to forecast the future.
PM and a team of incompetents
From destroying the electricity system to overseeing a growing migration crisis, Labor’s ministry of incompetents have proven to be way out of their depth.
Why Bullock half pivoted
All eyes will turn to Thursday’s potentially explosive unemployment numbers after the RBA’s ‘half pivot’ on Tuesday.
RBA’s risky business on rates decision
For the first time since the 1990s, the RBA is making an interest rate decision the day before the release of the ABS’ quarterly GDP figures.
Myer and Lew’s worthy choice
Olivia Wirth’s appointment as the new boss of Myer comes amid a leadership shake-up that underlines the influence of major shareholder Solomon Lew.
Beware the Bitcoin frenzy
Bitcoin hit a new record recently, which just goes to prove how detached the price is from anything approaching common sense.
GST carve-up farce time
The GST was supposed to have been about tax reform. It quickly became a grubby combination of bureaucratic meddling and self-interested political machination.
New fuel efficiency standard is ‘stupid and dishonest’
The Albanese-Chalmers-Bowen government’s so-called ‘Fuel Efficiency Standard’ is a classic example of Orwellian Newspeak that has nothing to do with real fuel efficiency.
Two time bombs ticking away
There were two explosive time bombs ticking away in the detail of the GDP numbers, and they threaten to put the RBA in an impossible position.
It’s official – things are crook
The latest GDP figures paint a picture of an economy that is sick, seriously sick. And if you look deeper, the problems are even worse than they seem.
Smashing NBN success story
The NBN plan to quintuple broadband speeds is a further validation of the Abbott government’s ditching of Kevin Rudd’s all-fibre fantasy.
It’s time to smash social media
Facebook, Google and other ‘big tech’ must be made to operate in accordance with the same laws that every other company and Australian adult has to.
Power regulators betray all of us
The ludicrously named Australian Energy Regulator and the Australian Energy Market Operator have been exposed as compromising their obligations.
Only one real option for RBA
The latest inflation data has left the RBA with only one real option at its next meeting. It won’t seriously consider a hike, but nor are cuts on the horizon.
Big two do a super job
Those laying into our supermarket operators would do well to consider the other options. North Korea anyone?
RBA should ignore bully boy Chalmers
The RBA should ignore Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ bully boy tactics, and must deliver what’s best for the economy when it meets on Cup Day.
Rates: It’s the Fed first
The US Fed’s rates decision is the real factor in how their economy, and by extension ours and our interest rates, will perform.
Qantas right to fight ACCC
Qantas has entirely plausible explanations for the so-called ‘ghost flights’ it’s being pilloried for, and the ACCC should stand down.
No need to race to rate hike on Cup Day
A lot can happen between now and Melbourne Cup Day, but as it stands there’s little reason for another RBA rate hike.
Inflation up but no Cup Day rate hike likely
Inflation kicked higher in the September quarter but not to a level which would demand a rate hike by RBA governor Michele Bullock and her board on Melbourne Cup day.
Rates are a worry but bonds are the real concern
A bad CPI could trigger another RBA rate rise but that’s nothing when compared with the effect of rising government bond yields.
ANZ board must apologise for $2.5bn placement fail
The ANZ board should review its understanding of its most basic obligation to shareholders after the bank was found guilty of breaching continuous disclosure rules.
Rate Hike? It’s Bullock and board
Read between the lines – it would take a seriously high CPI number to bring a rate hike onto the agenda on Cup Day.
Woke BHP’s $600m coal gift to Whitehaven
Whitehaven Coal shares rallied more than 10 per cent after investors quickly realised that the miner had scored a coup courtesy of BHP’s woke board.
Bullock is not itching to hike
Relax – new RBA governor Michelle Bullock is not looking for any excuse under the sun to raise rates.
Directors should pick up Voice bill
Company directors who poured shareholder funds into the failed ‘Yes’ campaign should dip into their own pockets to cover the costs.
Inside the Macfarlane’s attack on RBA changes
Ex-RBA head Ian Macfarlane has kept up his public attack on proposed changes to the central bank which he says will ‘seriously weaken’ the ability of the current governor to do her job.
Goyder right to go, on his terms
Richard Goyder’s departure is a sensible balance of bending into the media-driven hysteria over Qantas and discharging his governance obligations.
Wall St says: Trust the Fed
The smartest guys in the Wall St room pondered long and deep and decided the Middle East ‘event’ over the weekend could only add to last Friday’s ‘good news’ jobs data.
Israel’s 9/11 will rock global investment markets
The Hamas attack has been described as Israel’s 9/11 and no-one can say how it is going to play out, except that for the global economy and investment markets it won’t end quickly or well.
Time will tell if cap raising good for small Star investors
Small shareholders in battered Star Entertainment have until next Thursday to decide whether they want to take a punt on its latest capital raising. Here’s what they should know.
Be alert not yet alarmed as shares head lower
What we are seeing in the US is a growing realisation, with real-world consequences, that the ‘Goldilocks scenario’ maybe ain’t going to be happening.
Bullock’s huge policy message
It will take a big jump in the quarterly inflation rate, above 1.5 per cent, to spark a rate hike at the RBA’s pivotal Melbourne Cup Day meeting next month.
Why Woodside’s Voice support will backfire
Woodside joined with much of the big end of town in supporting The Voice. But recent events show it could become one of the ‘Yes’ vote’s biggest losers.
Goyder right to stick it out
The hysteria over Qantas has probably – hopefully – reached its high-water mark with the entirely bi-partisan assault on chairman Richard Goyder on Wednesday.
No rate rise Tuesday but still a chance in 2024
New RBA governor Michele Bullock won’t raise rates on Tuesday but surging wages – egged on by the off-the-leash IR minister Tony Bourke – could actually force hikes in 2024.
Seven gone just two to go
Only Queensland’s Annastacia Palaszczuk and the ACT’s Andrew Barr remain of the nine state, territory and federal leaders who ‘led’ us through the Covid years.
Yet again, a female successor is handed a poisoned chalice
Jacinta Allan is set to inherit a fiscal disaster that makes the ‘sins’ of the Cain-Kirner “guilty party” look like petty cash in comparison.
Jobs report flops big time
The government’s new Employment White Paper is a futile exercise with Tony Burke’s IR changes threatening to punch back hard against what little there is to stimulate jobs.
Outsider to media king: How Rupert Murdoch built his empire
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch flew to Melbourne in 1979 to make an odd purchase that would define his seven-decade journey to the top.
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