Australia wants Canada’s international student scraps
Recall that long-time immigration influencer Abul Rizi, who has forever championed a Big Australia and has ruthlessly attacked anybody arguing for lower immigration, amusingly endorsed the Canadian government’s sharp immigration cuts. In an article published on Independent Australia this month, Rizvi said the following about Canada’s immigration cuts: CONSISTENT WITH its announced long-term immigration plan
Big batteries flex their muscles as AEMO and ARENA underline “game-changing” role in phasing out coal
Bureaucratic bloat is crushing the economy
The larger the nation’s bureaucracy, the worse the policymaking. Data from the Australian Public Service Commission (APS) shows that the number of federal public servants increased by 7.4% in 2024-25, to a record high of 198,529. The public service headcount has increased by 24.7%—or 39,350 people—since Labor took office in May 2022. The APS report
No wonder families are leaving Sydney
In 2024, the NSW Productivity Commission warned that excessive housing costs were driving younger residents out of Sydney, resulting in a “brain drain” of 30- to 40 year olds. The NSW Productivity Commission found Sydney lost about 35,000 people aged 30-40 between 2016 and 2021. This week, Cotality released its September quarter housing affordability report, which
AI drives business investment boom
The robots are coming for your job. Expected capex is through the roof. Via the ABS. Total capital expenditure Estimate 4 for 2025-26 is $191.3b This is 9.4% higher than Estimate 3 for 2025-26 In this very rare case, the outcome is not related to mining. It is AI. Whoa! Westpac is bullish for GDP.
Albo mulls gas export levy
There are some days when an economist can only shake his head in appalled wonder. After the shock jump in monthly inflation on Wednesday, Treasurer Jim Chalmers said the government was still weighing up whether to extend the federal subsidy that is due to expire next month. …National Australia Bank chief economist Sally Auld said
APRA hits property investors with wet lettuce
On Thursday morning, a press release from APRA with the headline: ‘APRA to limit high debt-to-income home loans to constrain riskier lending’ At first glance, it sounds perfectly reasonable, but once one begins to read into the details, it swiftly becomes clear that it is yet another one of APRA’s wet lettuce leaf approaches to
five years on, the situation has not improved much....
Macro Morning
With Wall Street closed for Thanksgiving there wasn’t much of a boost for risk markets across the trading complex, with most stock indices finishing where they started and currencies holding on to their recent gains against the USD. The likely rate cut by the Fed in its December meeting is still in play with USD