ASX hits three month low; ASIC’s social media warning; Trump threatens NATO
News in brief
It’s interest rate decision day, and at 2:30pm this afternoon, the RBA is likely to tell us that rates will rise by 0.25 percentage points. Bond markets are pricing in about a three-in-four chance. All four big banks are tipping a hike.
Major lenders are working with the financial crimes watchdog to determine the extent of a mortgage fraud scandal after a Commonwealth Bank-commissioned report suggested that the number of loans based on doctored documents could be well beyond an earlier $1 billion estimate.
The corporate regulator is urging young Australians to ‘sense check’ the information they see online, as new research shows nearly two thirds of Gen Zs are using social media and about one in five are using AI to make decisions about their financial future.
US President Donald Trump said NATO faces a very bad future if US allies fail to assist in opening up the Strait of Hormuz. Trump has appealed to China, France, Japan, South Korea, Britain and others to send warships to keep the strait open, but none have made a commitment. Australia yesterday confirmed it would not send a warship.
Men are flooding into the beauty industry, buying make-up and make-overs, thanks to changing social attitudes and glam brands eager to explore untapped markets. According to Statista data cited by CNBC: in 2019, less than 10 per cent of US males said they wore makeup. In 2024, that number was 25 per cent.
Fear-o-meter
Paul Bloxham, chief economist, Australia, NZ and Global Commodites, HSBC on the downturn we have to have.
Australia's economy needs a downturn to deliver the necessary dis-inflation to get inflation back to the RBA's 2.5% target. This is the tough, hard and unfortunate reality.
The real questions are: how big will that downturn be, and how will it come about?
Headline inflation is 3.8 per cent, which is well above the RBA's target, and the recent sharp spike in oil prices is set to drive it higher yet. Core inflation should be less affected, but the risks are tilted to the upside, and it is also already far too high at 3.4%.
The needed downturn could come about because the RBA tightens monetary policy enough to generate a big enough downturn.
Alternatively, it could be that the current global energy shock, despite lifting headline inflation in the short run, markedly weakens global and local growth, eventually lowering inflation. A cut back on local public spending would also help to weaken demand and inflation, but in the face of the current negative global shock, this may be tricky to deliver or expect.
The policy choices are difficult ones for the RBA and fiscal policymakers.
Fear & Greed Q+A today
On the practical steps businesses can use to introduce (and scale) agentic AI:
“There was a fantastic stat that came out of MIT about six months ago that 95% of AI pilots fail. And that’s scary. Because you think about how much this has dominated Australian boardrooms for the last three years. Every chair, every CEO, every member of the C-suite is getting huge amounts of pressure on them to get AI, to get agentics, to get it live for their workforce and their customers. And then they try something — and in 95% of those instances it fails.
And the reason why is either they didn’t have the data in a good place, or they tried to just slap in an LLM or an AI model and hope for the best. They weren’t actually thinking about their employees or their customers through the lens of: when our customers interact with us, what’s the easiest way for them to engage with us? And when our employees use our AI, where is it built into the flow of their work?
We don’t want them accessing a different tool or switching between tabs and systems. It’s about asking: what do they use right now, and how do you make that experience a little bit better?”
This interview is from a series recorded as part of the Agentforce World Tour Sydney, looking at how agentic AI is transforming Aussie businesses.
The local sharemarket hit a three-month low yesterday, ahead of a likely hike in interest rates this afternoon. Miners were sold off as the price of gold fell below $US5,000 an ounce, while the war in the Middle East is keeping energy prices elevated. By the close, the S&P/ASX200 was down 0.4 per cent to 8583 points. It has been a very dramatic year for the market. The tech index so far this year is down 22 per cent, as investors fall out of love of major tech companies. The healthcare index on the ASX has also sold off sharply, on the back of an 18 per cent fall in 2026 from leader CSL. And the property and consumer discretionary indices have tumbled thanks to the prospect of higher interest rates. However, if you were buying the energy index at the beginning of the year, you’d be sitting pretty. It is up 25 per cent – and that is oil, gas and coal.
Greed-o-meter
Forwarded from a friend? Sign up to our daily newsletter