News T-Minus one week: US Election final preview With one week until the US presidential election we recap the forecasted outcomes and discuss the consequences for the AUDUSD.
Expats The Most Expensive Cities in the World for Expats 2018 According to a new report released by Mercer the price of expat life went up in 2018 for Aussies living in select cities.
News Budget Roundup Treasurer Scott Morrison unveiled the 2018-2019 last night. The plan was headlined by the promise of $140bn in tax cuts over the next decade, with immediate tax relief for middle and lower-income earners and a fundamental reform of the progressive tax system.
News Australia & the US / China Tariff War As the US and China engage in a tit-for-tat trade war Australia remains caught in the middle. The two countries have implemented sweeping and crippling tariffs on vast swaths of inter-country trade. What does a trade war mean for Australia? The Importance of China and the US to Australia Both the...
Australia Australia at the Forefront of Embracing Blockchain In an important step for the industry, Australia’s main stock exchange, ASX Ltd., announced late last week that they will start using blockchain.
Market Update Market Updates: What To Know This Week What's new in market updates around the world? We analyse key financial and currency news for the week.
Market Update Australian Dollar suffers from divergent policy outlooks It has been a rough few weeks for the Australian dollar. The Aussie has lost nearly 3% versus the US dollar over the past month and many banking analysts are predicting the bad run to continue into 2018.
News Flash Payments Welcomes Bankers’ Endorsement of Government-Backed Cryptocurrencies A government-endorsed digital Australian dollar has the potential to lead to increased trust and certainty, particularly to grow the digital currency marketplace.
News $7 billion remittance industry set for massive shake-up The $7 billion Australian money remittance industry is set for a massive shake-up as a new wave of online and digital-based players enter the market. According to Ashley Jessen, CEO of Profile Booster, the retail money remittance industry is a top candidate for fintech disruption and innovation. “A few years
Ripple Ten New Customers Join Ripple’s Global Payment Network Ripple announced the addition of 10 new customers to their growing global network. Among them some of the world’s largest banks, innovative smaller banks, and payment service providers (PSPs). As the only blockchain provider that has real use cases and customers using our solution commercially, more and more customers
Market Update Aussie dollar gain on French election result The Australian share market and dollar have been beneficiaries of Emmanuel Macron's victory in the first round of the French presidential election, as the centrist looks increasingly likely to win the run-off. The biggest initial beneficiary of the outcome was the euro, which jumped around 2 US cents
Market Update Sterling up. Aussie down. Market update. The British pound was the big mover this week as the UK unexpectedly headed to the polls. Westpac's Sean Callow discusses how durable sterling's rally is likely to be. He also discusses the role of the RBA minutes in the AUD/USD decline earlier this week
Banks Banks to ditch sales incentives to ‘restore trust’ THE toxic sales culture in Australian banks that sees customers saddled with inappropriate financial products may finally be coming to an end. Maybe. All four big banks have committed to winding back the “deep-seated” culture of product-based incentive payments after an independent review into the practice. Stephen Sedgwick AO, the
Regulation ASIC enforcement taskforce recommends tightening bank rules to protect customers Banks, financial services houses and credit companies will face public naming and shaming over bad behaviour in a suite of major reforms being considered by the Turnbull government. However, the reforms put forward by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission enforcement review task force do not include naming the executives
Australia Bank executive takes over as new chief of the Digital Transformation Agency Gavin Slater, former NAB executive, will be the new chief executive of the Australian government’s Digital Transformation Agency. In a statement the Assistant Minister for Digital Transformation Angus Taylor said Slater had a proven track record in driving transformation change to respond to digital disruption, and his experience would
FinTech Fintech all talk no action in bank competition race Australia's banking sector is one of the most highly concentrated in the world and the much-hyped arrival of digital disruption has hardly shifted the dial. More competition is not the solution to the housing affordability crisis, but there is no doubt it would benefit consumers. Australian Competition and
Regulation ASIC’s Greg Medcraft lashes bank ‘oligopoly’ Chairman of the corporate watchdog Greg Medcraft lashed out at the banking “oligopoly” for chipping away at customer trust with sector-wide interest rate hikes out-of-cycle with the Reserve Bank of Australia. “I think every time you do an out-of-cycle increase you chip away that trust,” Mr Medcraft said. “It’s
Market Update AUD CAD Exchange Rate Slides after AUD-Damaging Trade Report The Australian Dollar has dropped against the Canadian Dollar due to a concerning report about AU-US ties. The report looked at Australia’s relationship between the US and China, and the potential difficulties of trying to alter these relationships. With the US looking increasingly protectionist, Australian officials have considered whether
Australia The Australian Dollar Forecast to decline over 10% One of the most significant drivers in currency markets is relative interest rates as investors transfer capital from lower interest rate currency jurisdictions to higher interest rate currencies. Last weeks 25 bps interest rate hike in the United States and a closing gap between Australian interest rates and those in
Market Update The Australian dollar rallied back to the highs after FOMC The Australian dollar surged back above the 0.7700 level on Thursday morning, propelled higher by renewed US dollar weakness after yesterday’s US Federal Reserve lifting interest rate by 25 basis points. The gain in the AUD/USD was the largest in percentage terms since 2nd June 2015. With
Australia ANZ, Westpac admit breaches in forex trading ANZ and Westpac have followed rivals and yielded to the corporate regulator’s investigation into banks’ foreign exchange businesses, agreeing to oversight and changes after traders shared confidential client information and traded to benefit themselves. Similarly to the CBA and NAB transgressions, ASIC said Westpac traders disclosed confidential details of
News Best countries in the world - ranked Best Countries is a rankings, news and analysis project created to capture how countries are perceived on a global scale. Created by U.S. News in partnership with Y&R's BAV and Wharton, the rankings evaluate 80 countries across 24 rankings drawn from a survey of more
News Why now could be the right time to buy property in Spain UK-based relocation service MoveHub compared 2016 property price data from the Global Property Guide with average salaries according to the Hay’s Group Global Salary Forecast. In Spain, a 2.2 percent hike in salaries against a 5.75 drop in property prices put it in second place behind the
Market Update US rate hike at next meeting "would likely be appropriate" if data is good enough, Fed's Yellen The Australian dollar finished lower the last week, breaking sharply on rising expectations for a U.S. interest rate hike at the Fed’s next meeting on March 15. Strong U.S. economic reports and continued hawkish remarks from U.S. Federal Reserve officials were the catalysts behind rising U.
Currency Conversion Sydney, Melbourne property now affordable – if you are ultra-rich Sydney and Melbourne property is finally becoming more affordable, but only for the ultra rich. Despite both cities being in the middle of a housing affordability crisis, luxury house/apartment prices have plunged down the list of the world's most expensive luxury residential property markets. Shanghai saw the
