By Leith van Onselen Last weekend, CoreLogic released its preliminary auction clearance rates, which revealed the following results: Today, CoreLogic has released its final auction results, which reported a large 4.0% decline in Sydney’s auction clearance rate to just 48.6%, with Melbourne’s also falling by 3.1% to 54.1%: According to CoreLogic, this was the weakest
By Leith van Onselen The Minister for Jobs and Industrial Relations, Kelly O’Dwyer, has encouraged employers to give the under/unemployed a fair go: The Minister for Jobs and Industrial Relations, Kelly O’Dwyer, will today tell businesses they need to do more to assist the unemployed into jobs… O’Dwyer’s message to employers is that “industry and
Excellent news, from The Australian: Australia is working on plans with Papua New Guinea to develop a joint naval base on Manus Island, edging out Chinese interest in the strategically vital port with a new facility that would be capable of hosting Australian and US warships. The Australian understands Malcolm Turnbull and PNG Prime Minister
Join us today as MB Fund Head of Investments, Damien Klassen, Chief Strategist David Llewellyn Smith and Tim Fuller discuss the future of the Pacific Peso. – What is sitting behind the recent fall in the AUD? – Can the current drivers be relied upon for future direction? – How is the Emerging Markets Crisis and Trumps Trade
Bloomberg has forced the RBA to cough up its thoughts on the trade war via FOI: Scenario details Australia is exempt from the aluminium and steel tariffs in scenario 1. In scenarios 2 and 3 we assume that the United States applies a 20 per cent tariff on Australian exports. However, we assume that Australia
By Leith van Onselen Statistics New Zealand has released national accounts figures for the June quarter of 2018, with Gross domestic product (GDP) rising by 1.0% over the quarter to be up 2.7% year-on-year. GDP per capita rose by 0.5% in the June quarter and by a soggy 0.7% year-on-year – the equal lowest per
By Leith van Onselen In the wake of Deloitte’s latest report calling for a $75 increase in the Newstart Allowance (aka the ‘Dole’), the $2 a week increase provided as part of the bi-annual CPI adjustment has been ridiculed as “laughable”. From The Guardian: The federal government says a $2 boost per week to Newstart
By Leith van Onselen It seems the property industry by-and-large does not support Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s claim that Labor’s negative gearing and capital gains tax (CGT) reforms would crash the market. Below are the responses from various industry insiders: THE AGENT: Starr Partners chief executive officer Douglas Driscoll warned far more research was needed
By Leith van Onselen The chair of a parliamentary inquiry into the development of Australia’s cities, Liberal MP John Alexander, has called for immigration to be slowed until infrastructure has caught up: …He said benchmarking immigration against infrastructure planning and progress was key to ensuring population growth was underpinned by the necessary infrastructure. “At the moment
The AFR wakes up the sleeping monster of Australian economic destruction today: Stronger oil prices and the softer Australian dollar have combined to propel theoretical returns from Queensland LNG exports to record levels, with commodity prices in local currency now above the average when the projects were given the go-ahead for construction. New analysis from
Iron ore prices for September 19, 2018: Spot down. Paper more. Steel up. Here it comes, via Reuters: The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the top state planner in the country, said in a news briefing on Tuesday that China would ramp up investment in infrastructure, as well as in agriculture, poverty alleviation and
By Chris Becker A modest night for US stocks with European bourses taking the most risk as the recent rise in Euro and Pound Sterling moderated. The Aussie dollar remains on a tear, up to the mid 72’s versus USD and strengthening on all the crosses. US Treasury 10 year yields remain above 3% with
DXY was soft last night: AUD launched: But couldn’t keep pace with EMs: Gold was up a bit: Oil more: Base metals mixed: Big miners moonshot: EM stocks rallied: EM junk led the way: Treasuries were flogged: Bunds too: Aussie bonds were smashed and short-end yields broke out: Stocks were firm: Westpac has the wrap:
By Leith van Onselen A new study by The ABC shows that satisfaction with Australia’s political system has plunged to all-time lows, with distrust growing and voters flocking to minor parties: Most Australians no longer trust any tier of government: federal, state or local council. Government ministers and members of parliament — trusted by less
Domainfax is in fake uproar today: Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull spoke to News Corp executive chairman Rupert Murdoch two days before last month’s Liberal Party leadership spill, urging the media mogul to stop a campaign against him. Mr Turnbull challenged Mr Murdoch over the coverage of his government in News Corp newspapers and its
By Leith van Onselen Back in July, outgoing Infrastructure Australia (IA) CEO, Philip Davies, warn that Australia’s infrastructure provision is failing badly in the face of strong immigration-fuelled population growth: Mr Davies said if planning for major projects did not change at all levels of government, the major capitals would not cope with the population growth. “An
By Leith van Onselen MB’s theme that Australian households are under pressure from falling real income growth, high household debt, and insecure employment has received some support with the ABS yesterday releasing data showing 15% of employed persons (1.9 million people) working second jobs: Of the 1.9 million multiple job holders, 54% were female and
Global Macro / Markets / Investing: Tesla stock drops on report company faces US criminal probe over Musk’s take-private Tweet – CNBC Cryptocurrency Exchanges Are Vulnerable to Manipulation, Report Finds – WSJ No, the Financial Crisis Didn’t Spawn Populism – WSJ Buyback ‘Blackout’ to Test U.S. Stock Market – WSJ Reflections on the Lehman collapse,
The Bank of Japan kept guidance and its policy intact today at the latest meeting, with no negative impact on Yen or stocks, as the rest of Asia continue the risk on mood from overnight markets. While the Yuan appreciated slightly offshore today against USD, the new round of tariffs has not filtered through to
Via The Australian: NAB boss Andrew Thorburn faces a pay cut of about $1 million as the bank reduces executive bonuses, amid a campaign to regain public trust following damaging royal commission hearings. …“Where NAB falls short of customer, shareholder and community expectations, the new framework provides the board with the ability to hold leaders
Kind of. The Australian dollar is up and away as China’s Li Keqiang makes soothing noises today: Aussie bonds are getting hosed. The short end even threatening to break out. Great buying for mine: ASX is up modestly: Dalian too: It’s all about dirt as markets shift to incorporate more Chinese stimulus. Big Iron is
By Leith van Onselen Fairfax’s Ross Gittins has penned an excellent article today lamenting the neoliberal obsession with transferring the provision of public services to private providers: A key part of the era of what we used to call “micro-economic reform” has been to take services formerly provided by governments – and sometimes charities –
Via S&P: Australian prime home loan arrears rose year on year in July but remained unchanged month on month, according to a recently published report from S&P Global Ratings. The Standard & Poor’s Performance Index (SPIN) for Australian prime mortgages, which has been steady at 1.38% since May, was up from 1.17% a year earlier.
By Leith van Onselen Late last year, The SMH reported on the dire situation facing Australia’s university graduates, whereby there were 22 graduates fighting for every graduate job: Across Australia, about 22 university graduates are competing for every new graduate position and many will need to settle for low-paying entry roles “just to get their
Excellent stuff from Damien Boey at Credit Suisse today: Has Assistant Governor Kent discovered religion? No. RBA Assistant Governor Kent has just delivered a speech on money creation. The primary purpose of his speech is to dispel the myth that the growing gap between bank loan growth and deposit growth explains or predicts the rise
By Leith van Onselen In June last year, the Australian Senate cross-bench voted with the Turnbull Government to pass its $23.5 billion ‘Gonski 2.0″ needs-based schools funding bill. In the lead-up to the Senate vote on Gonski-2.0, several education experts voiced their opposition to Labor’s original flawed Gonski model, urging reform. These included: the Grattan
Via an increasingly hysterical Ambrose Evans-Pritchard today: If Donald Trump and his close advisers think China’s economy is tottering on the brink and acutely vulnerable to pressure, they are sorely misinformed. …Construction is picking up after a slowdown earlier this year. Industrial profit margins are at a seven-year high of 7 per cent, despite a
Via Westpac: •The six month annualised growth rate in the Westpac–Melbourne Institute Leading Index, which indicates the likely pace of economic activity relative to trend three to nine months into the future, fell from 0.5% in July to -0.02% in August. The growth rate in the Index has been volatile through 2018 but appears to
By Leith van Onselen Already under fire from the union movement for passing the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement because of its deleterious impact on Australian workers, some Labor MP are also in open revolt. From The Herald-Sun: Minutes of a heated meeting of federal Labor MPs last week have been leaked, revealing widespread internal
Via DEEWR: A slightly better month but the trend has definitely falttened out.
