In handing down Western Australia’s latest budget last week, WA Treasurer Rita Saffioti announced $1.4 billion worth of measures aimed at addressing issues in the WA housing market. With the Western Australian housing market seeing rapidly rising prices and a dire lack of rental housing, Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) chief economist Cassandra
Equity markets in Asia are somewhat bullish although the latest softish CPI print kept Australian stocks and the dollar steady, despite further calls of cuts from the RBA. The USD is trying to clawback lost ground but its really all about the Yen at the moment as the BOJ indicates some hawkish positioning around their
Following a wave of softer-than-expected data and the dovish May RBA decision, CBA has revised its expectations for interest rate cuts forward. “We now expect the RBA to cut the cash rate by 25bp to 3.60% at its 7-8 July meeting”, CBA senior economist Belinda Allen wrote. “And a follow up 25bp rate cut in
Australia delayed implementing global anti-money laundering rules for nearly two decades. In March, the Anti-Corruption Data Collective (ACDC) and Transparency International released the inaugural Opacity in Real Estate Ownership (OREO) Index, which ranked Australia last in the world. The index ranked major developed nations on two key criteria: 1) the scope and accessibility of real
Recently, it was revealed that the membership ranks of the Liberal Party were plummeting, with one party source claiming that the biggest party expense at the local level was “funeral wreaths”. Twenty years ago, in Victoria, the Liberal Party had approximately 15,000 members. Today, more recent figures indicate that the state’s party membership stands at
The Market Ear with more on the hated rally. Still little chatter… …about ATHs. SPX practically at range highs. Let’s see how this plays out from here, but an extension of the squeeze is not consensus. FOMO risk is huge. Source: LSEG Workspace NDX seasonality “We are entering positive seasonality for the NDX. Over the last 25
Once upon a time, the immigration intake into Australia was a mostly benign issue, with the intake as a proportion of the population largely ebbing and flowing in a relatively limited range, consistent with the underlying conditions present in the economy. There were exceptions to this, most notably the return of servicemen and women following
Via the ABS. CPI analytical series Seasonally adjusted 2.4 2.4 2.1 CPI excluding volatile items* and holiday travel 2.6 2.8 2.7 Annual trimmed mean 2.7 2.8 2.4 Two basis points under market expectations. The chart: Trimmed mean inflation is also running well behind the RBA’s forecasts, as illustrated below by Alex Joiner from IFM Investors:
Geoff Wilson, founder of Wilson Asset Management, stepped up his attack on the Albanese government’s proposed tax on unrealised superannuation capital gains, which he labelled “unfair” and “un-Australian”. The proposed policy would increase the earnings tax on superannuation balances of $3 million or more from the current 15% to 30% without indexation. It would also
The ferrous market does not look well to me. Scuttlebutt is pretty good. The benchmark July iron ore on the Singapore Exchange was 0.15% higher at $93.65 a ton. Hot metal production, a gauge of iron ore demand, inched up 0.24% week-on-week to 2.422 million tons, as of June 20, according to data from Chinese