australian

Australian lender NAB to close Hong Kong office

Reuters0

By Navya Mittal and Echha Jain (Reuters) – National Australia Bank (NAB) said on Thursday it would shut its Hong Kong branch, as offices in Singapore, Tokyo and Shanghai were its preferred customer outreach hubs in Asia. The move is likely to impact about 50 roles in the Hong Kong, however, the lender said in a statement that its “too early” to confirm the impact of the branch closing. “The decision probably reflects that foreign businesses are not finding operating conditions in Hong Kong as conducive as they once were,” said Tim Waterer, chief market analyst at KCM Trade. Shares

Read more

Australian business conditions hold strong in Aug, cost pressure elevated

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian business conditions proved resilient yet again in August with a broad uptick in sales, profits and jobs, while inflationary pressures remained elevated, a result that could add to the case for more monetary tightening to tame inflation. A survey from National Australia Bank Ltd (NAB) released on Tuesday showed its index of business conditions rose to +13 in August, from an upwardly revised +11 in July. Its volatile measure of confidence bounced 1 point to +2. The survey’s measure of employment gained 3 points to +9, while the sales index picked up 1 point to +18

Read more

Australian pension fund to invest $1.6 billion in data centre firm

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia’s largest pension fund, AustralianSuper, said on Tuesday it would buy a minority stake in a major European data centre business for A$2.5 billion ($1.6 billion), its first significant investment into data centre platforms. The A$300 billion AustralianSuper will join U.S. investment manager DigitalBridge as a key shareholder in Vantage Data’s Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) business, it said in a statement. Institutional investors have been drawn to data centres, which house servers and hardware equipment. Dealmaking in the sector has spiked in recent years as requirements for big technology companies to manage and store data

Read more

Australian regulator sues PayPal unit over unfair term in small business contracts

Reuters0

(Reuters) – Australia’s securities regulator said on Thursday it will take PayPal’s local arm to court alleging that the digital payments giant’s standard contracts with small business customers contain an unfair term that could overlook errors in overcharging, burdening its clientele. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) said it has started proceedings against PayPal Australia Pty Ltd in a case that highlights a contract term that gives PayPal business account holders 60 days to notify discrepancies in fees charged. “We have been working in full cooperation with ASIC and take this matter very seriously. It would not be appropriate

Read more

Australian regulator warns pension funds over unlisted company valuations after Canva slump

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian pension funds need to improve how they value private equity, the sector’s regulator said on Monday after a review into the sector’s treatment of Canva, an Australian technology startup whose lofty valuation tumbled last year. Sydney-headquartered software firm Canva hit a peak valuation of $40 billion in late 2021, only to be revised sharply lower to $25.5 billion last August amid a downturn in technology stocks. Major funds including Aware Super and Hostplus were investors. The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) on Monday said while most funds had “appropriate” valuation practices for Canva,

Read more

Australian delegation heading to Beijing for dialogue, government says

Reuters0

By Kirsty Needham SYDNEY (Reuters) – An Australian industry, government, academic and media delegation will travel to Beijing for dialogue with Chinese counterparts on Thursday, another step in stabilising ties, Foreign Minister Penny Wong said on Saturday. The high-level meetings, which do not include government ministers, had been held annually since 2014 as a platform to discuss issues of concern, but stopped after 2020. Australia’s former Labor trade minister Craig Emerson will head the Australian delegation, which will include former Liberal foreign minister Julie Bishop, to show bipartisan political support, a statement from Wong’s office said. Trade, investment, regional and

Read more

Australian gig workers to get right to negotiate minimum pay, conditions

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian gig workers will be able to negotiate for minimum pay and conditions under a new law to be introduced next week in parliament by the centre-left Labor government. The law will define “employee-like workers” in the gig economy, a catch-all term including those who deliver food or drive for apps like Uber or DoorDash. Australia’s industrial umpire will then be empowered to set standards around pay, hours and insurance. However, the umpire will have discretion to vary standards between workplaces and the laws will not mandate uniform pay or conditions. Employment Minister Tony

Read more

Biden sends condolences to families of three US marines killed in Australian aircraft crash

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – President Joe Biden on Monday sent his condolences to the families of three U.S. Marines killed in an military aircraft crash on a northern Australian island as rescue and recovery personnel began work to bring the remains home. An MV-22B Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft carrying 23 Marines crashed then caught fire on Melville Island, just off the northern coast of Australia, on Sunday morning local time. The Marines were taking part in military exercises. “Jill and I send our deepest condolences to the families of the Marines who lost their lives in this dead crash,” Biden said in

Read more

Chevron, Woodside say no updates on Australian LNG wage talks as unions file safety complaint

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson and Alasdair Pal SYDNEY (Reuters) – Woodside Energy and Chevron said on Thursday there were no updates on wage disputes at some of Australia’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities, as the unions involved in talks filed a safety complaint against Woodside. Woodside’s North West Shelf and Chevron’s Gorgon and Wheatstone Australian LNG operations together supply about 10% of the global LNG market. Some 99% of the workers on offshore platforms that supply gas to the North West Shelf LNG plant have agreed to let the union take action including calling strikes, which could disrupt shipments and

Read more

Explainer-Worker disputes at Australian LNG producers roil global gas market

Reuters0

By Sudarshan Varadhan and Lewis Jackson SINGAPORE/SYDNEY (Reuters) – Woodside Energy Group and U.S. major Chevron are locked in a dispute over pay and job security with about 700 workers at four facilities in Australia that produce more than a tenth of the world’s liquefied natural gas (LNG). Here is what is expected in coming days, and what is at stake. WHAT’S THE LATEST? Nearly all workers at offshore platforms that supply gas to the Woodside facility have voted to authorise the union to strike, although unions have not made a call yet. Woodside was “well off the pace on

Read more

Outcome of Chevron, Woodside, Australian unions talks may take days

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) – Negotiations between Chevron, Woodside Energy Group and Australian unions on Tuesday are unlikely to yield results for days because unions will need to consult members on any decision, according to a source with knowledge of the matter that was not authorised to speak to media. Chevron and Woodside negotiated with unions on Tuesday to avert potential industrial action over pay and conditions at Australian facilities that supply about 10% of the LNG market. Chevron said through a spokesperson that bargaining was continuing and “we seek outcomes that are in the interests of both employees

Read more

Biden to host Australian PM for an official US visit

Reuters0

(Reuters) – Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will travel to the United States for an official visit in late October, the first since winning election last year, according to a statement from his office on Thursday. The leaders will hold talks on topics including the AUKUS security deal, climate change and critical minerals during the four-day visit from Oct. 23-26. “My visit is an important opportunity to discuss our ambitious climate and clean energy transition, and shared goal of a strong, secure and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Albanese said in a statement. The trip comes at a time when mutual concerns about

Read more

Australian $100 billion pension fund says active in Japan, neutral on China

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson and Praveen Menon SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia’s third largest pension fund will stay active in Japanese markets in the coming months and is neutral about China despite growing investor aversion to the country’s markets, a senior executive said on Tuesday. The A$160 billion ($104 billion) Aware Super made “good money” recently due to an overweight position in Japanese equities, Head of Investment Strategy Michael Winchester said in an interview with Reuters. “Japan has been such an incredible story,” said Winchester. “[Tactically] I think we’ll be very active. We don’t currently have a position on, but it’s a

Read more

Australian July business conditions hold firm, costs jump anew

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian business conditions again proved solid in July with sales, profits and employment all above average, while a spike in labour costs and prices suggested inflationary pressures had yet to abate. A survey from National Australia Bank Ltd (NAB) released on Tuesday showed its index of business conditions dipped to +10 in July, from an upwardly revised +11 in June. Its volatile measure of confidence bounced three points to +2. The survey’s measure of sales held firm at +16 in July, while the employment index stayed at +6 and profits at +10. Forward orders, a leading indicator

Read more

Australian consumer sentiment slips in Aug amid economic angst

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian consumer sentiment slipped in August as a decision by the country’s central bank not to hike interest rates for a second month did little to soothe worries about the economic outlook. The Westpac-Melbourne Institute index of consumer sentiment dipped 0.4% in August from July, when it bounced 2.7%. The index reading of 81.0 showed pessimists again outnumbered optimists, a level that used to be only associated with recessions. A slowdown in consumer spending is one reason the Reserve Bank Australia (RBA) held rates steady at 4.1% last week, though it cautioned that it might yet have

Read more

Former Australian childcare worker charged with sexual abuse of 91 children

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – A former Australian childcare worker has been charged with 1,623 child abuse offences against 91 children between 2007 and 2022, federal police said on Tuesday. The 45-year-old man has been in custody in Queensland state since August 2022 when police arrested and charged him initially for making child exploitation material. Police alleged more self-produced child abuse material was found on electronic devices purportedly owned by the man, after further investigations since his arrest last year. “This is one of the most horrific child abuse cases that I’ve seen in nearly 40 years of policing,” New South Wales

Read more

Australian prime minister raises prospect of early election over housing impasse

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia could go to an election more than a year ahead of schedule as opposition parties threaten to block a flagship housing bill for a second time, providing the government with the constitutional trigger for an early election. The parliamentary deadlock revolves around the centre-left Labor government’s A$10 billion ($6.7 billion) housing package, which The Greens party is refusing to pass through the upper house without changes to increase spending and cap rents. Governments can dissolve both houses of parliament if the upper house twice blocks a bill passed by the lower house. The

Read more

Foreign bank lending to Australian offices hits record as local banks retreat

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) – Foreign bank lending to Australian office real estate hit a record high in the first quarter as overseas lenders continued to stump up cash for a struggling corner of the property market out of favour with local banks. Foreign bank loans to Australian office property rose by A$1.2 billion ($816.1 million) to A$35.5 billion in the March quarter, the highest level in a series going back to 2004, according to the latest data from the prudential regulator. The data does not identify individual banks, however a separate dataset covering overall corporate lending showed European,

Read more

Australian BNPL firm Zip’s credit performance in local market weakens further

Reuters0

(Reuters) – Australia’s Zip Co Ltd said on Thursday it faced a jump in bad debts at home grounds, its biggest market by revenue, during the March-June quarter due to poor domestic consumer credit and discrepancies with third-party payment processors. The country’s biggest standalone buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) provider said Australia’s June-quarter net bad debts, which are written off as a percentage of the total transaction value (TTV), came in at 3.1% – its highest value since the first quarter of 2022. BNPL companies typically offer on-the-spot interest-free short-term loans with minimal credit checks that spread payments over weeks or months, and

Read more

Australian developer Lendlease to cut about 740 jobs globally

Reuters0

By Scott Murdoch and Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) -Australian developer Lendlease will cut about 740 jobs globally, or roughly 10% of its workforce, according to an internal memo on Tuesday seen by Reuters. The bulk of the cuts will be in the company’s international operations, according to the memo. Lendlease has roughly 7,800 employees across Australia, Europe, the U.S. and Asia, according to its website. CEO Tony Lombardo said in the memo the developer would aim to grow its funds management business, and focus on development projects, which supported that growth while “rightsizing our construction workbook around jobs that carry

Read more

Australian banks say low unemployment is buffering home loans

Reuters0

By Byron Kaye SYDNEY (Reuters) – The CEOs of Australia’s two biggest banks said on Thursday a tight labour market was keeping late home loan repayments below historic levels even after a year of rising interest rates, but warned that living costs would squeeze the economy through 2023. The updates from Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Westpac gave a sense that the A$2 trillion ($1.4 trillion) mortgage market, a bedrock of the world’s thirteenth largest economy, may avoid a downturn that economists feared when the central bank began raising rates in May last year. In two days of parliamentary hearings

Read more

PwC asked to name companies it pitched on basis of leaked Australian tax plans

Reuters0

By Lewis Jackson SYDNEY (Reuters) – Two lawmakers on Thursday called on PwC Australia to name all the companies it sought to advise on the basis of leaked government tax plans, after a report linked Google to the national scandal first exposed in January. Citing two sources, Reuters reported on Wednesday that Google had received confidential information from a former PwC employee confirming the likely 2016 start date of a law targeting multinational tax avoidance after there had been calls from a number of organisations to delay the legislation. A cache of 144-pages of PwC emails dating from 2014 to

Read more

Australian broker Openmarkets fined $3 million for ‘market integrity’ violations

Reuters0

(Reuters) – Openmarkets Australia Ltd was fined a record A$4.5 million ($2.99 million) after a panel found the retail broker in violation of numerous market integrity rules, the country’s corporate regulator said on Thursday. Routine surveillance from the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) had identified repeated suspicious trading by an Openmarkets client. The client had placed simultaneous bid-and-ask orders in the same security at the same price on 2,011 occasions. Openmarkets had reasonable grounds to suspect that these orders were likely to have the effect of creating an artificial trading price or a false or misleading appearance of active

Read more

Australian watchdog urges banks to move Indigenous clients into low-fee accounts

Reuters0

(Reuters) -Australia’s corporate regulator on Wednesday asked the country’s banks to disclose data on fees charged to Indigenous consumers after a review found they were not meeting targets for moving First Nations people into low-fee accounts. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) found that many Indigenous consumers are paying up to A$3,000 ($2,007) in overdraw fees a year as they are using high-fee transaction accounts, despite being eligible for a low-fee basic account. Low-fee accounts have small monthly charges for account-keeping and transactions such as withdrawing money from automated teller machines, while high-fee accounts include fees for overdrawing or

Read more

Australian home prices climb for fourth month in June

Reuters0

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian home prices rose for a fourth consecutive month in June as a sustained squeeze on housing supply helped lift values nationwide, data showed on Monday. Property consultant CoreLogic figures showed national home prices were up 1.1% in June from the previous month, after bottoming in February and starting a sustained rise. Australia’s households are among the most indebted in the world, while housing affordability has recently plumbed all-time lows. The Reserve Bank of Australia is set to raise its key interest rate by 25 basis points to 4.35% on Tuesday to curb stubbornly high inflation, although

Read more