Afternoon Report | ASX lower ahead of RBA meeting

This is the Fear and Greed Afternoon Report - everything you need to know about what happened in the markets, economy and world of business today, in just a few minutes.

1. ASX lower ahead of RBA meeting

2. Barnaby Joyce joins One Nation

3. Arnott’s gets cash injection

4. Costello stopped Future Fund trip

5. Japan, Australia condemn aircraft incident

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the Fear and Greed Business News Afternoon Report
for Monday, the eighth of December. I'm Michael Thompson, and
every afternoon we've got the five stories that happen today
that you need to know about. Let's go with story
number one. The S and p ASX two hundred closed
just a touch lower today, down zero point one percent
to eighty six hundred and twenty four points. Nine of
the eleven sectors lost ground, with utilities and miners the

(00:27):
worst the best, with the telcos Telstra jump to one
and a half percent today. Broadly, it seems to investors
are perhaps waiting a little to see what happens tomorrow
when the Reserve Bank Board meets. It's less about the
cash rate decision. The RBA is widely tipped to keep
rates on hold, and more about what Governor Michelle Bullock
says afterwards about the outlook and inflation. We've also got

(00:48):
the US Federal Reserve expected to cut rates later in
the week. Two. I mentioned the miners having a bit
of an ordinary day. The gold miners were off today.
Numont was down two point one percent, Northern Star off
one point five four percent, But the lithium miners had
a cracker, still enjoying last week's optimism after UBS upgraded
the outlook for the sector. Liontown was up nearly fifteen

(01:10):
percent today, Pilborough Minerals up more than six percent and
it's quickly worth a mention. The Australian dollar hit a
three month high this morning, just under sixty six and
a half US sense story number two. Now, it's been
a busy day in Canberra or in this case, I
suppose Tamworth really where Barnaby Joyce is confirmed he is
joining One Nation. On a local radio station alongside Pauline Hanson.

(01:34):
Joyce said he will stay on as the Member for
New England for now before trying to move back into
the Senate by twenty twenty eight, which is when the
next selection is expected. Pauline Hanson said that she is
emotional about the move and believes Joyce brings serious economic
and rural experience, calling him a front row forward, not
a bench player. National's leader David little Proud has slammed

(01:56):
the decision as you would expect, accusing Joyce of turning
his back on the party that backed him and I
quote through his darkest moments elsewhere in federal politics, they
storm over travel entitlements claimed by Communications Minister Anika Wells
is continuing to build with reports she build tax payers
almost nine thousand dollars for flights so that her husband
could attend three consecutive AFL Grand Finals, and Treasurer Jim

(02:20):
Chalmers has announced the government's three hundred dollar power bill
subsidy will be scrapped at the end of the year.
We'll have more on all of these stories tomorrow morning
under story number three. Now and Arnot's the maker of
tim tams and shapes and Scotch fingers and SAOs and
saladas and more. I can keep listening them. Really, it's
getting a forty five million dollar injection from the federal
government's National Reconstruction Fund. The money is part of a

(02:43):
one point seventy five billion dollar refinancing deal as the
heavily indebted company, owned by US private equity giant KKR,
rolls over loans that were due next year. Arnot's sales
climbed to one point seventy six billion dollars last year,
helping it to scrape back into the black with a
small profit after a sizable loss the previous year. The

(03:04):
National Reconstruction Fund says the funding will help upgrade production lines,
support advanced manufacturing, and back on it's push to sell
more timtams offshore, but the opposition has labeled it a
taxpayer bailout. Onto story number four, the former chair of
the Future Fund, Peter Costello, personally intervened to stop a
planned international business class trip for the CEO's executive assistant.

(03:27):
The Financial Review reports that the trip, if it had
gone ahead, would have been the EA's third such trip.
We talked a fair bit about the first two last week.
It comes after the two hundred and sixty one billion
dollar Future Fund has already admitted spending about twenty thousand
dollars sending the EA overseas to inspect hotels and negotiate
room rates, plus a second business class trip to assist

(03:49):
the board. CEO Raphael Aren't has defended the costs, saying
the project delivered larger savings on accommodation. The government says
the travel of the sovereign wealth fund owned by taxpayers
does meet official guidelines, but critics suggest that it shows
accountability as slipping. And finally, story number five, Australia and
Japan have jointly condemned an incident where a Chinese fighter

(04:13):
jet repeatedly locked its fire control radar onto Japanese aircraft
near japan Dokinawa Islands over the weekend. That kind of
lock on is treated potentially as a lead in to
an attack, forcing jets to take evasive action the Japanese
military aircraft for tracking a Chinese carrier at the time.
Japan's Defense minister has called it a dangerous and extremely

(04:37):
regrettable incident and lodged a strong protest with Beijing. China
has rejected the claims as completely inconsistent with the facts
and accused Japan of smearing it As tensions rise between
the two countries. Defense Minister Richard Marles, who was in
Tokyo to inspect shipyards after a major warship deal, says
Australia is deeply concerned by the incident. And that's it

(04:59):
for the other Noon Report for Monday, the eighth of December.
Make sure you're following the podcast and headlong to Fearandgreed
dot com dot au to sign up for our free
daily newsletter. I'm Michael Thompson. Enjoy your evening,