By Lucinda Jerogin, Associate Economist at CBA: The September quarter headline CPI materially surprised to the upside, jumping 1.3%/qtr to be 3.2% higher annually. The policy-relevant trimmed mean measure accelerated to 1.0%/qtr and 3.0%/yr. Offshore this week the FOMC and BoC cut rates by 25bp, as was widely expected. However, a more hawkish tone curtailed
International Reading: Chipotle CEO sounds alarm on the American economy – Yahoo USDA Quietly Deletes Its Contingency Plan for Funding SNAP – Notus Binance helped Trump crypto company make billions – Independent Not a good sign: Hershey Warns of Soft Halloween Candy Sales – Bloomberg Trump Ballroom Fiasco Takes Worse Turn as Economic Data Gets
Asian markets are generally lower although the latest Tokyo inflation numbers saw Japanese stocks rise swiftly with another BOJ rate hike now on the cards while the outcome of the Trump-Xi summit is not inspiring confidence in other risk markets. In currency land, the USD is getting stronger again with the Australian dollar pulled back
Justin Fabo from Antipodean Macro published the following chart comparing the official cash rates of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) against the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ). Fabo stated on Twitter (X) that “the RBNZ often goes harder in both directions on rates”, in reference to its recent higher peak and lower trough
Last week, I argued that Australia is the dumbest developed nation on Earth for choosing to give itself expensive and unreliable energy when it is literally a global energy superpower rich in everything other than oil. In retrospect, I should have awarded the “dumbest developed nation” prize to Germany, which stupidly chose to blow up
In decades now long passed, the issue of migration was largely one of practical considerations, defined by questions such as: How many new arrivals per year is viable? How many homes do we need to build? What skills base needs to be expanded? What is the right path toward integrating new arrivals into society while
In the annals of wasted public investment, few attempts to build an industry can compete with the abject failure of hydrogen. $60 billion in incentives are available for hydrogen research and production, most of it sitting on the shelf, unused. Hydrogen was only ever going to be a niche industrial gas for decarbonising such things
The Market Ear on equities. Running hot The tech squeeze has already hit, with MAG 5 stocks now making up 61% of U.S. GDP. Forced buying and upside panic have stretched the right tail to the breaking point—now, the question is whether the rally can hold, or if a sharp pullback is inevitable. Too much
Housing minister Clare O’Neil continues her blame game and propaganda tour, this time taking aim at the Greens for “blocking” the construction of new homes: O’Neil’s latest attack follows the dismal dwelling construction data released this month by the ABS, which showed that completions fell by 2% in 2024-25 and were tracking 65,970 (27%) below
Australia is experiencing its worst rental crisis in living memory. According to Cotality, the number of homes listed for rent across the combined capital cities is tracking at its lowest level on record following an 18.5% annual decline. Australia’s rental vacancy rate has also declined to a record low of 1.5% nationally, down 0.4% over