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AU Financial Review
3 days ago
- Business
- AU Financial Review
Amazon's CEO is right on AI job losses. $154m bonuses are proof
To understand why Amazon chief executive Andy Jassy's warning on artificial intelligence job losses is very, very real, just look at the $US100 million ($154 million) sign-on bonuses Mark Zuckerberg's tech giant Meta Platforms is offering to attract top AI talent. The bonuses were confirmed by Sam Altman, the co-founder and chief executive of artificial intelligence pioneer OpenAI, which created ChatGPT. On a podcast called Uncapped, he said his staff had been targeted as Zuckerberg tries to build a team to chase the idea of superintelligence, which is AI that exceeds human intelligence.
West Australian
3 days ago
- Business
- West Australian
Iron ore price drops again to flirt with multi-year lows amid gloomy forecasts
The value of WA's most important mineral commodity is tumbling towards lows not seen in two-and-a-half years, putting three of the four big banks on track for vindication. A tonne of the benchmark iron ore product is currently being traded for $US92.40 after shedding $US1.10/t overnight. It was above $US100/t during the middle of last month. The steel-making commodity's value is now at its lowest point since September and could be heading towards a sustained sub-$US90/t price for the first time since November 2022. Iron ore briefly dipped below $US90/t in September — hitting $US89.50/t — but quickly rebounded. Shares in local mining giants BHP, Rio Tinto and Fortescue were all in the red on Wednesday. Fortescue is the most exposed to fluctuations in the iron ore price of the trio and its stock was down more than 4 per cent by noon. Temporary factors and long-term structural shifts in the global steel market are behind iron ore's price decline. Construction in China, where virtually all of WA's iron ore is pumped into, is currently at a seasonal ebb. The Asian powerhouse has also ordered its steelmakers to curb their output this year to supposedly meet carbon emission reduction requirements. More broadly, China's multi-decade building boom is winding down. Rio Tinto's iron ore chief executive Simon Trott last year said the peak of steel demand from the country had been reached. India has been touted as a new growth market but its iron ore consumption is still nowhere near China's. While demand is waning, supply has been steadily rising, and tens of millions of additional tonnes are soon set to come online from Brazil and West Africa. Global investment bank Citi this week downgraded its iron ore forecasts, predicting the price to stay around $US90/t over the next 12 months. Australia's banks have been even more bearish. Commonwealth Bank reckons the price will drop to $US80/t this year, Westpac thinks it will start 2026 at $US86/t, and NAB is pencilling in a 2025 average of $US87/t. ANZ has been an outlier and last month raised its short-term iron ore prediction from $US90/t to $US100/t. WA's Treasury in December adopted a $US95/t expectation for the 2025 financial year, marking a $US18/t increase from the price estimate on Budget day in May. Every $US1/t change in iron ore's value can directly add or remove almost $100m from the State's coffers. For the 2024 financial year, WA received just under $10 billion from iron ore royalties. Nearly 90 per cent of WA's entire royalty income stream comes from iron ore.
Sky News AU
4 days ago
- Business
- Sky News AU
Uranium stocks surge following announcement of $US100m deal
Sky News Business Editor Ross Greenwood says the uranium sector has been on a tear this week – thanks to the launch of a new uranium investment fund. The fund called Sprott has pledged to spend $US100 million on uranium. The share price of uranium companies reacted by gains of up to 11 per cent in some cases.
AU Financial Review
4 days ago
- Business
- AU Financial Review
Panicked investors rush to uranium stocks to front run price spike
Investors are piling into the Australian sharemarket's uranium sector in an attempt to front-run a spike in prices as the world's largest physical uranium fund readies a war chest to splurge on the nuclear fuel. Uranium stocks – among the most shorted stocks on the ASX – have roared higher this week after Toronto-based asset manager Sprott announced it sold $US100 million ($153 million) worth of units in its physical uranium trust to broker Canaccord Genuity.
The Age
5 days ago
- Business
- The Age
The ticking time bomb facing the global economy
The latest eruption of conflict in the Middle East has the potential to do considerable damage to markets and economies at a moment when both are vulnerable because of the US assault on global trade. So far, Israel's attacks on Iran have been largely confined to its nuclear facilities, its military assets and leadership and its domestic energy infrastructure. It's energy exporting infrastructure hasn't yet been targeted. Markets have been unsettled, rather than disrupted, and the impact of the outbreak of hostilities relatively muted. The oil price did shoot up 7 per cent on Friday, but sharemarkets weakened only slightly, US bond yields fell back modestly, the US dollar strengthened marginally and the gold price rose. In 2022, oil prices soared above $US100 a barrel and then climbed towards $US130 a barrel after Russia invaded Ukraine. On Friday, the oil price leapt nearly 13 per cent before settling back to close 7 per cent higher at just over $US74 a barrel. It traded around $US75 a barrel over the weekend. The relative calm in markets in response to the latest conflagration in the Middle East signals that traders believe the hostilities can be contained and that oil supplies won't be disrupted. That could, of course, change. Iran is a major oil producer, with production volumes of about 3.4 million barrels a day, or about 3 per cent of the world's oil supply. It exports about 1.7 million barrels a day, mainly to China and, to a lesser extent, India. Loading Should its oil fields and pipelines be targeted by Israel, it would have a material impact on global supply. That impact, however, could probably be absorbed relatively comfortably by a market where there is substantial dormant capacity because of OPEC+'s voluntary production cuts and where the market is currently over-supplied.
