Publication
Data centres sound alarm
Microsoft and NextDC have warned the NSW government in closed-door meetings that they could abandon the nation’s largest state and back data centre developments in Victoria or South-East Asia, saying that locking in power supply and the speed of...
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Surprise tax increase hits PE, VC funds
A shock retrospective budget change has wiped out a tax break that helped top venture capital and private equity executives amass personal fortunes, in an inadvertent blow industry leaders warn will undermine investment confidence in Australia and add...
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▶ Banning credit payments flagged months ago ATO warned Labor over card costs
The Albanese government knew for months the Australian Taxation Office was preparing to stop accepting credit card payments and backed the decision, before backflipping in response to a backlash from small business. Treasurer Jim Chalmers and...
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‘Crisis of its own making’
An alliance of 30 business and industry groups has warned the Albanese government it has only itself to blame for the continuing fallout from the May budget because it rushed the key tax changes and failed to consult anyone with expertise in...
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Web of Bathla shadow loans unfurls
The family behind the Bathla property empire took on millions of dollars in informal loans right before the company collapsed, and are involved in secret real estate development projects outside its administration. Bathla, a developer specialising in...
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Behind the $44b Firmus train wreck
It was the silence that gave it away. For weeks, Firmus and its bankers had been on a charm offensive. But between Tuesday morning and Wednesday lunchtime last week, it all unravelled. People interested in buying stock, up to that point, had been...
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NSW chasm with federal Labor grows
NSW will use a scheme designed to subsidise the development of renewable energy generation to build new gas power plants as early as next year, a decision that puts the country’s largest state at odds with the Albanese government’s reluctance to...
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Coalition majority firms in Victoria
Victorian Liberal leader Jess Wilson’s chances of governing in her own right after next month’s election are firming as voters in the state back the Coalition to manage the issues of most importance to them. But The Australian Financial Review/...
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Blame flies as Firmus IPO flops
Major Firmus Technologies investors have accused the heavyweight investment banking syndicate working on the unsuccessful $44 billion listing of providing misleading information and leaving them in the dark as recriminations over who was at fault for...
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Firmus frenzy fades in a flash
The biggest Australian sharemarket listing in a generation has buckled, with Firmus Technologies and its heavyweight advisers scrambling to find a path for the artificial intelligence infrastructure play to go public in the face of lukewarm interest...
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Investment ‘at risk’ after mine ruling
Industry groups have warned that future investment in coal and gas projects across the country has been put at risk by a landmark High Court ruling that overturned the approval of a NSW coal mine extension because authorities failed to properly...
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Consumer confidence shatters
Consumer confidence has plunged to its lowest level since the 1990s recession after the Reserve Bank of Australia’s latest interest rate rise, underscoring mounting discontent with the Albanese government’s economic management amid fresh warnings of...
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KPMG plea for $100m relief loans
KPMG Australia is seeking up to $100 million in emergency loans from the firm’s global network as well as a waiver of all or part of its more than $100 million annual subscription fee, also known as the global levy, for using the brand, as it tries to...
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Comyn gives Labor script for growth
The country’s top banker, Matt Comyn, has urged federal and state governments to tighten their belts and make hard choices to boost productivity, calling for a tax pivot towards consumption and a concerted push to make Australia a second home for US...
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Heroism wins after terror at 34,000 feet
London | It was the calm before the chaos. Winging their way back to Israel, passengers on FlyDubai Flight FZ1073 on Wednesday were doing the things passengers do at 34,000 feet. Some of the 174 onboard were watching films, others reading. Among them...
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Crunch time for private credit giants
Metrics Credit Partners will be forced to rewrite more than two dozen sets of financial statements after its auditors, KPMG, concluded the valuations of assets across its $40 billion private asset empire were inflated. The audit even identified...
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Bullock rebuffs Labor on rates
Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock has rebuffed Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ claim that the Middle East conflict is the primary source of Australia’s inflation problem, warning domestic spending remains the key driver of rising prices, and stagnant...
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Labor heads for record tax take
Jim Chalmers is on track to become the highest taxing treasurer in Australian history, as new budget figures reveal tax revenue as a share of the economy has surpassed the previous Coalition government’s ceiling and sits just shy of the record held by...
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Building surge fires up inflation
Construction is growing at its fastest pace in more than six decades as data centre and housing building surges, with labour shortages and soaring material costs creating a challenge for the Reserve Bank of Australia ahead of a widely expected move to...
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Medicare hack ‘tip of the iceberg’
Security experts warn more revelations of unauthorised AI agent infiltrations will follow the OpenAI breach of the Medicare statistics website as the government considers changing the law to hold artificial intelligence companies liable for cyber...
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AI breach spurs call for shields
The unprecedented breach of Medicare and other government websites by a rogue OpenAI agent has exposed critical gaps in Australia’s cyber preparedness, as experts warn that it underscores the need to build sovereign defensive artificial intelligence...
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Wood warns of trust, risk challenges
Productivity Commission chair Danielle Wood has warned that declining trust in governments makes it harder to impose contentious economic reforms, as she lamented a boardroom culture that preferenced compliance over strategy and investment. In a...
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Power can come from Logan City as much as Canberra
The modern history of our country, of any country, is inevitably a history of power – how, why and where it’s exercised, and to what end. When the AFR Magazine Power issue began, you could point to power; you could point to the cabinet rooms,...
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Chalmers bets on AI for growth
Treasurer Jim Chalmers is pinning the government’s hopes on an AI-driven productivity surge to avert a bleak economic future in which federal debt could exceed 55 per cent of GDP and the deficit quadruples, despite Treasury admitting the technology’s...
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Having a Captain Cook
| Anthony Albanese says Australia will be among nations adopting a global framework on the rollout of AI to ensure ‘‘humans remain in control’’, at the same time Donald Trump announced moves to fight any attempt at regulation. The prime minister was at...
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KILL SWITCH
The beginning of the end for humanity starts well. The billions of dollars poured into building super-intelligent artificial intelligence platforms ushers in a new era of efficiency and scientific discovery. Cancer is cured, breakthroughs in renewable...
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Backpacker visas slashed
The Albanese government will cut working holiday visa numbers by almost 40,000 a year as part of its quest to force down immigration numbers, sparking outrage from tourism operators and primary producers who warn their industries will be hit hard. The...
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Canberra readies for diesel curbs
The Albanese government has put the public service on notice that it must be prepared to limit diesel use and get fuel to where it is most needed if shortages worsen, as a long conflict in the Middle East continues and major suppliers consider...
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We pick who comes here: ANZ boss
ANZ chief executive Nuno Matos says Australia should adopt a businesslike approach to immigration by tailoring intake to the skills the country needs, rather than simply accepting anyone who wants to move here. As One Nation, the Coalition and Labor...
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Beijing’s biggest bank plays politics with cheap mining loans
China’s biggest bank issued lossmaking or marginal loans to Australia’s biggest resources and infrastructure companies as a way of starting longterm relationships that would help progress Beijing’s political goals. Almost 4.8 million leaked documents...
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One Nation to cut 750k short visas
Pauline Hanson’s One Nation will slash foreign temporary visa holders by more than 750,000 over three years by targeting international students and families of skilled migrants, tapping into growing voter dissent over housing shortages and stretched...
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Bond sell-off blows $10b budget hole
The global bond market sell-off has punched an estimated $10 billion hole in federal and state government finances, piling more pressure on Treasurer Jim Chalmers and the states to curtail budget deficits as the country’s interest bill soars to a...
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Nvidia plan to power AI push
Nvidia says its chips will use more energy in Australia next year than all the existing data centres currently require as the American giant unveiled ambitious plans to power artificial intelligence in the country. Widely considered the world’s most...
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Westpac warns on housing
Westpac chief Anthony Miller says Australia’s housing shortage will cause property prices to start rising again next year, forecasting values to increase by 3 per cent and then 8 per cent the year after, wiping out the cooling effect of the Albanese...
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RBA sees slowdown but no recession from housing slump
Reserve Bank of Australia assistant governor Sarah Hunter says a slump in the housing market is hurting the broader economy and will dampen the construction of new homes, but rejected developers’ claims that it was pushing the country into...
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Hanson gazumps Coalition again, announces Ley’s old super policy
A proposal by One Nation to let workers access 3 percentage points of their superannuation contributions is a copy of a policy the Coalition was about to announce under former leader Sussan Ley, escalating concerns inside the opposition that Pauline...
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Woodside’s $24b bet on US LNG rises out of Louisiana swamp
Across a sweltering stretch of former Louisiana swamp, Woodside Energy’s biggest global bet is rising out of compacted earth. As alligators sometimes slide by, mobile cranes, tip trucks, emergency vehicles, utes and excavators crunch across the...
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Algorithm ban ‘risk to online trade’
Leading tech entrepreneurs have warned that government plans to force social media platforms to remove the algorithms that drive users’ feeds would fail to stop people being exposed to misogynistic, violent or other harmful content and be disastrous...
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Lost and founder |
High-profile founder and former Telstra director Bridget Loudon-Harris will walk away with nothing after Expert360, the start-up that put her on the map, was sold in a cut-price $16 million deal.
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Builder fury as worker visas stall
At a Labor fundraising dinner at Royal Perth Yacht Club last week, a cluster of Western Australia’s top building industry figures used their place at the top table to bend Jim Chalmers’ ear about an issue of rising concern to them. At the heart of the...
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Bathla founders missing in action
Me, help. Those are the words written into the dusty windows of the permanently closed shopfront in this corner of western Sydney. The footpath is strewn with glass, and tiles have been ripped off the building. Paint bubbles from poor water sealing;...
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Labor on top in tight poll
One Nation has slipped behind Labor in the fifth lead change between the two parties in as many months, suggesting both have hit a ceiling in nationwide support and will battle for ascendancy all the way to the next election. The latest results from...
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BUSTED FLUSH
Star Entertainment gutted problem gambling programs and discussed misleading Brisbane casino lenders with inflated earnings forecasts, according to documents that also reveal the gaming giant was forced to fire a senior executive just 10 days after he...
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Bathla collapse intensifies
The failure of Sydney developer Bathla is turning into one of the country’s biggest real estate collapses, after administrators revealed that the estimated $3.3 billion owed to creditors did not include the deposits paid by thousands of apartment...
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Carroll seeks to distance himself from secret tax – but is keeping it
Premier Ben Carroll has sought to distance himself from a secret tax on Victorian public transport fares that was intended to help pay for Labor’s $34 billion Suburban Rail Loop, which an audit has found to be unfunded and likely to blow out in cost...
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Climate change concerns fade as investors rediscover carbon
As John Kite went cap in hand through the corporate towers of Singapore, Hong Kong, Melbourne and Sydney in June, he became quietly confident he could raise the $200 million needed for his NSW coal export terminal. But when it came time for investors...
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Exit the King: Succession moment has been years in the making
He is the epitome of a key man, and now he’s leaving. Phil King says his time at the top of the country’s capital markets is coming to an end, with the 57-year-old flagging he will step down as the chief stock picker at the investment house he founded...
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Bitter Murdoch trust war laid bare
It was the most closely watched trust dispute in the world, yet no one knew what was said inside the Nevada courtroom as the Murdoch family went to war over the future of their sprawling media empire. Now, the bitter clash that tore the family asunder...
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Buyers on strike, warn realtors
Realtors are bracing for the toughest spring in years, warning that buyers have gone on strike before what is traditionally the most popular time to sell amid property tax concession changes and higher interest rates. Listings were already falling and...
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Skin cancer breakthrough
| Former Australian of the Year Georgina Long was in Lisbon when news broke that her work on skin cancer therapies had hit the jackpot. Moderna announced positive results for a vaccine lauded as a turning point in the fight against melanoma, and...
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Inside the endless inquiry into the Federal Court’s (alleged) cronyism
For three years, the national corruption watchdog has been secretly examining claims of cronyism and illegal hiring at the Federal Court, an investigation that has been disrupted by stonewalling officials and a surprising intervention from former...
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JB Hi-Fi sales fall off as NAB paints a pessimistic property outlook
National Australia Bank has detailed a more pessimistic outlook for the country’s property market than its major rivals, forecasting that the amount lent to real estate investors will fall for the first time since 2020. The uncertainty caused by...
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Inflation rise warning on migrant cuts
Deep cuts to migration proposed by conservative political parties will damage an economy weakened by Labor’s entrenched federal budget deficits, which are already putting pressure on younger Australians and exacerbating inflation, former Treasury...
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‘Partner lies’ in KPMG cover-up
The KPMG lawyer tasked with first investigating claims the firm was using confidential client files to win contracts accused partners of misleading him and hampering his work as they sought to cover up their wrongdoing. The firm’s deputy general...
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Smelter bailout could fall short
The $2.5 billion government bailout of the Tomago aluminium smelter in NSW could require hundreds of millions of dollars in extra funding if global aluminium prices tank or renewable electricity proves more expensive than expected, leaving taxpayers...
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Housing fears overdone: Comyn
Commonwealth Bank chief executive Matt Comyn says the housing market had been running too hot, backing Labor’s sweeping changes to property tax concessions and dismissing worries about short-term price falls. Delivering a better-than-expected $11...
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Stokes warns on cooling investment
SGH chief executive Ryan Stokes says it is too early to assess the full impact of major tax concessions changes introduced by the Albanese government, even as he warns serious uncertainty is putting off investment. Stokes made the comments as he...
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Healthy growth
| Tim Gurner is pouring tens of millions of dollars into expanding his Saint Haven chain of wellness clubs, including $15 million on the Saint Haven Black club in Melbourne’s Toorak, but has vowed to keep his property development firm private.
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Lurch to populist left
The Albanese government’s handpicked small business advocate has warned that Labor has significantly underestimated the restructuring costs caused by its trust tax crackdown and urged Treasurer Jim Chalmers to secure state stamp duty exemptions for...
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Coles to send up to 1000 jobs to India
Coles plans to move as many as 1000 jobs to India as part of a deal with Accenture, allowing the supermarket giant to cut costs and invest in its online operations as it faces intense competition from Amazon. The supermarket chain will outsource...
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Andrews’ conduct was concerning, says IBAC
Victoria’s anti-corruption watchdog has found that former premier Daniel Andrews and senior members of his government engaged in ‘‘ serious and concerning’’ conduct in dealings with the firefighters union to end a bitter industrial...
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Property price slide exposes political peril for PM
Australians have long complained that residential property has become unaffordable. But as the sharpest housing market correction in almost four years gathers pace, the Albanese government is discovering that not all voters necessarily welcome falling...
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Fed chief’s invisible man routine leaves bond markets baffled ▶
It was, according to economists at JPMorgan, the single most troubling presentation by a Federal Reserve chairman in more than a decade of news conferences given by those at the very top of the US central bank. And, for Australian investors, it all...
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Courts face avalanche of AI slop
Workplace claims filed by selfrepresented litigants have exploded in the Federal Court, more than doubling over the past year as artificial intelligence supercharges employee actions against businesses and creates a major headache for judges forced to...
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Rinehart’s road map for Coalition
Australia’s richest person, Gina Rinehart, says she still has strong relationships with senior federal Coalition figures after throwing her support behind One Nation but warned parties with declining support should overhaul climate and immigration...
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▶ Allegra Spender ▶ Companies
growing uncertainty stoked by the Iran-US war, which began with a strike on Tehran at the end of February. NAB’supdate followsa similar warning in June from Westpac, which cited the tax changes as part of the reason for the slump in home loans. Half...
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