According to The Guardian, Australia’s tobacco excise rate has tripled in the past decade, from 46c to $1.40 per cigarette, accounting for $28 of the average $40 price for a packet of 20 cigarettes. This has led economists to suggest either a freeze or a cut to the excise rate while Australia cracks down on
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Dick Markes says the quiet part out loud. The Australian. Acting Prime Minister Richard Marles says the nation will inevitably be drawn into a US-China conflict with the continent now more relevant than ever to the contest between the world’s great powers, as America ratchets up its military presence on Australian soil. …Mr Marles said
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Overbought, says the Market Ear. SPX vs US financial conditions The two have moved in tandem, but note the latest little gap… Source: BNY Turning cautious The great JPM market intelligence team have played the melt up well. They are turning more cautious here: Geopolitical tensions and energy price spikes raise pullback risk, though any
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The Commonwealth Grants Commission (CGC) reduced Queensland’s share of goods and services tax (GST) revenue by $2.4 billion in March due to the state’s strong revenue from coal royalties. Queensland’s GST allocation was also reduced by $384 million in 2024-25. Federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers indicated at the time that he would not overrule the independent
It’s the bust that keeps on giving. Sales volumes were flat year on year. But that’s the end of the good news. Starts are still in free fall, down nearly 80% from peak. And there is still more empty, idle, half-built and unsold stock than you can poke an entire country at, about one-third from
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Slowly but surely, iron ore is breaking down. Yesterday’s May output data was the weakest in six years. Yet, it is not yet doomsday, except, perhaps, for the climate. China has abandoned any pretence of a green steel transition. The output falls are equally large in BOF and EAF, but the Five Year Plan was
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In last month’s budget speech, Victorian Treasurer Jaclyn Symes labelled the state government’s controversial Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) project as “Australia’s largest housing project”. “The Suburban Rail Loop is Australia’s largest housing project”, Symes proclaimed. “With Melbourne expected to reach the size of London by the 2050s, it will deliver 70,000 more homes on the
Sell Abu Dhabi half of Santos. Or some fraction of that makes sense to the national interest. We must all remember the history of this evil firm. As explained by The Australian in 2017 (below), Santos built two LNG export trains out of Gladstone, Queensland, without enough gas to meet export contracts. As a result,
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DXY is flopping around like a dead fish. AUD is back near the top of its rising channel. Lead boots are floating higher. Two shorts? Metals grinding higher. Miners yuk. EM meh. Junk OK. The steepener steepens. Stocks love a good bombing. All together now to the Beach Boys “Bomb, bomb, bomb…bomb, bomb Iran. Bomb,
As the G7 meeting in Canada gets underway, the headlines are still dominated by the Israeli-Iranian war with the potential for a ceasefire pushing European and US stocks higher overnight. The USD was able to gain some lost ground but remained quite mixed against the currency majors with news of a potential trade deal
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Iran denies US assertion it is 'months away' from developing nuclear bomb"Iran does not seek a nuclear weapon. If we wanted to build a nuclear weapon, we could have done it some time ago, but we decided that nuclear weapons would not augment our security and are in contradiction to our ideological views," Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says.
Australia’s superannuation concessions need to be adjusted to make them more equitable and sustainable. According to the Australian Treasury, superannuation concessions cost the federal budget around $60 billion in foregone revenue in 2024-25 and are expected to grow rapidly. Concessions on contributions cost the federal budget $30,950 billion in FY25, rising to $36,750 billion in