The local sharemarket rebounded from its sell-off earlier in the week, with the S&P/ASX 200 closing up more than one per cent to 8692 points. It means about $34 billion of the $90 billion in value wiped out on Monday has returned. The rise came after US President Donald Trump suggested the war against Iran could end soon, and oil prices fell back below $US90 a barrel. Trump said the military operation was “very far” ahead of its initial four-to-five-week timeframe. Only problem is it’s very hard to know whether that’s true. Markets are being driven by whatever headline is loudest, and Trump tends to be noisier than most.

Listen to today's episode 🎧 

News in brief

Australia’s involvement in the conflict in the Middle East is growing. Five members of the Iranian women’s soccer team have been granted asylum, while Australia will deploy aircraft, missiles and about 85 personnel to the region. Yesterday Energy Minister Chris Bowen said that Australia’s fuel security situation was “good”.

Consumer sentiment rose slightly last month, although there remain more pessimists than optimists, according to the Westpac, Melbourne Institute reading. The ANZ Roy Morgan poll says confidence nosedived in response to the war in the Middle East.

The total value of Australian dwellings has pushed past $12 trillion for the first time. That compares to about $4.5 trillion for the superannuation sector, making housing clearly the most valuable asset class. 

David Littleproud has resigned as leader of the Nationals after almost four years in the job, and two splits in the Coalition in less than a year, saying he was too exhausted to continue in the role.

The conflict in the Middle East is discouraging travellers from heading to Europe via the region, but plenty have changed direction and are buying tickets routed through the US. United Airlines chief executive Scott Kirby said the number of customers from Australia and New Zealand travelling to Europe through the US had jumped to more than 1000 a day.

Fear-o-meter

Much of economics is about how people feel. Do they feel rich or poor? Do they think prices will rise or fall? Is now a good time to make a large purchase?

Several economic surveys yesterday, on consumer sentiment from Westpac and the Melbourne Institute, and from ANZ and Roy Morgan, and on business confidence from National Australia Bank, provided mixed views.

The upshot: Inflation expectations are on the rise, even if prices aren’t increasing significantly.

The problem with inflation expectations is if people think prices are going up, it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. People demand higher wages and expect to pay more for goods. As a result, prices rise.

Adding to the inflation pressure is what’s known as the “wealth effect”. People that feel wealthy spend more. ABS figures showing that the total value of the housing sector is now $12.3 trillion, and median values in NSW, Queensland and Western Australia have pushed beyond $1 million, suggest a “wealth effect” is kicking in.

All this adds weight to the argument that interest rates need to rise.

Fear & Greed Q+A today

On how AI has changed student accommodation provider Scape, which has grown from four to 38 properties in a decade:

 

“Like any large organisation right now, we have pressure on productivity and efficiencies — how do we optimise and how do we engage our workforce but still deliver a great student experience.

 

And for us it has to be a balance. It has to be a balance where the teams within Scape are feeling inspired, empowered, motivated… taking away the pain points for them and giving them back the things that they love doing and that they’re proud about.

 

So agentic AI for us has been absolutely a no-brainer because of our scale. We have 20,000 apartments and at key arrival periods we can be looking at up to 10,000 check-ins.”

 

This interview is from a series recorded as part of the Agentforce World Tour Sydney, looking at how agentic AI is transforming Aussie businesses.

Greed-o-meter

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