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Speaker 1: It's Thursday, the fifth of December twenty twenty four. Welcome

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Speaker 1: to the Fast five Business News by Fear and Greed,

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Speaker 1: where we give you the top five business stories you

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Speaker 1: need to know and just five minutes. Are Michael Thompson

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Speaker 1: and good morning Sean Aylmer. Good morning Michael, Sean. Five stories,

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Speaker 1: five minutes, massive day today, Let's get going. Story number one.

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Speaker 1: The Australian economy grew by just zero point three percent

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Speaker 1: in the September quarter, taking annual growth to less than

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Speaker 1: one percent, which is sewn its lowest level since the

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Speaker 1: early nineteen nineties if you, of course, exclude the COVID pandemic.

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Speaker 2: Now the pace of growth was better than the zero

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Speaker 2: point two percent recorded in the June quarter. Though the

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Speaker 2: trend is down. The good news is that we are

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Speaker 2: likely to have hit the low in economic growth. From

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Speaker 2: here things should improve, albeit slowly. The National Accounts from

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Speaker 2: the Bureau Statistics is the best averall snapshot of what's

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Speaker 2: going in the economy. The reason there was growth in

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Speaker 2: the September quarter was government spending think energy debates, tax cuts,

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Speaker 2: health and disability support payments, defense spending, trade and residential

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Speaker 2: construction added slightly to growth. Lower consumer spending detracted from it.

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Speaker 2: A rundown in inventories detracted a lot from it. Households

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Speaker 2: are saving about three percent of their income, which is

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Speaker 2: relatively low. Now economists talk about per capita GDP growth

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Speaker 2: per person better measure of living standards. It fell by

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Speaker 2: zero point three percent as population growth outpaced economic growth.

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Speaker 2: It's been going backwards for seven quarters now out productivity growth.

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Speaker 2: That disappointed again. That dropped by zero point four percent

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Speaker 2: over the quarter.

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Speaker 1: Sean, it all sounds like doom and gloom. Please tell

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Speaker 1: me there's something good in here.

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Speaker 2: There's always the opposite in economics. You know that. Now

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Speaker 2: the National Accounts shows us what happened in the September quarter.

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Speaker 2: It's backwards looking. Data for the current quarter, including retail sales,

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Speaker 2: just suggests a bit of an improvement. Having said that,

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Speaker 2: the data was pretty undwhelming. Even Federal Treasury of Jim

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Speaker 2: Chalmers was struggling. He blamed interest rates, cost of living pressures,

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Speaker 2: and global uncertain and his Michael the bottom line to

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Speaker 2: all that yesterday things aren't going well, but the Reserve

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Speaker 2: Bank ain't going to take too much out of it.

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Speaker 2: They're worried about inflation that's the main game. Means it's

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Speaker 2: probably not still not going to get a rate cut

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Speaker 2: for a while.

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Speaker 1: Okay. Story number two seawan. The Commonwealth Bank has backed

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Speaker 1: down on plans to move some customers to an account

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Speaker 1: that charges a three dollar fee for withdrawing cash over

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Speaker 1: the counter at its branches after the federal government intervened trusure.

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Speaker 2: Jim Chalmers called Commonwealth Bank Boss Matt Common to communicate

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Speaker 2: the government's concerns. After the bank said it would move

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Speaker 2: around one million customers from an old account that didn't

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Speaker 2: charge withdrawal fee to a new one. The decision on

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Speaker 2: Tuesday didn't go down well. Social media, talkback radio was

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Speaker 2: a light with it yesterday. While the new account will remain,

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Speaker 2: the bank has slowed down shifting all customers across to it.

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Speaker 2: There is another part to the story. So they're moving

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Speaker 2: from something called the Complete Access account, which the bank

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Speaker 2: stopped offering in twenty sixteen complete Access to this Smart

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Speaker 2: Access account. Smart Access has a lower overall fee. In fact,

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Speaker 2: Commonwealth Banks as ninety percent of customers are better off

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Speaker 2: under the Smart Access versus the Complete Access. Anyway, they've

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Speaker 2: backed down on shifting everyone across at this point.

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Speaker 1: Story number three. The numbers are in from the Black

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Speaker 1: Friday sales, which ended on Monday night, and Sean's spending

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Speaker 1: was up.

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Speaker 2: The Black Friday sales are now a key calendar date

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Speaker 2: for retailers and in recent years they've dragged forward Christmas sales.

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Speaker 2: Data from National Australia Bank show spending was up four percent,

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Speaker 2: even though transactions were down by the same amount slightly

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Speaker 2: fewer purchasers of more expensive products. That's the bottom line,

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Speaker 2: NAB said. Australians are spending more thoughtfully, choosing quality over quantity.

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Speaker 2: There's also a big jump in spending on experiences, which

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Speaker 2: now put down to people planning ahead or being better

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Speaker 2: at planning ahead, for example buying air tickets, car high etc.

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Speaker 2: Like that. For the summer break story number four.

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Speaker 1: This is a big one, Sean. It's really the story

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Speaker 1: that's dominated global headlines over the last twenty four hours.

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Speaker 1: South Care is in crisis after the president Yune Soukiol

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Speaker 1: imposed martial law on the country briefly, then he backed

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Speaker 1: down and triggered a constitutional crisis.

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Speaker 2: Remarkable few hours in that country. Yune declared martial law

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Speaker 2: in an unscheduled broadcast on Tuesday night, saying he needed

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Speaker 2: to purge the country of anti state forces and normalize

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Speaker 2: the country. He backed down a few hours later after

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Speaker 2: it was unanimously rejected by the opposition controlled legislature. Troops

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Speaker 2: had been sent to surround the parliament, but they were

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Speaker 2: then withdrawn. Opposition parties are saying Yune's declaration of martial

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Speaker 2: law is a grave violation of the constitution. It's an

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Speaker 2: act of treason. Even his own party, according to media reports,

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Speaker 2: are wondering whether he can stay now. This bid to

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Speaker 2: impose martial law was his first time that's happened in

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Speaker 2: South Korea since democracy was restored in the nineteen eighties.

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Speaker 2: This crisis all happened in about a six hour period.

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Speaker 1: Extraordinary last one sean story number five. I've major US

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Speaker 1: retailers think Amazon and Walmart and Target are increasingly competing

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Speaker 1: on the basis of service rather than price, with fast

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Speaker 1: delivery being a trigger for customers to spend more.

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Speaker 2: The big retailer is introduced to day than one day

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Speaker 2: than same day of delivery, often for a fee. According

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Speaker 2: to a reporting the New York Times, retailers in the

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Speaker 2: US have found speedy deliveries make customers both more loyal

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Speaker 2: and more willing to spend money. Amazon says the faster

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Speaker 2: they deliver, the more people come back. They quote. The

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Speaker 2: New York Times quotes the spokesperson saying it's not exactly

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Speaker 2: rocket science, but it was an AHA moment for US.

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Speaker 2: Amazon has redesigned its fulfillment centers to get stuff out

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Speaker 2: the door fast. Walmarts is now doing delivery in as

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Speaker 2: little as thirty minutes. It has a big advantage forty

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Speaker 2: six hundred stores across the US. It can do same

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Speaker 2: day delivery to eighty six percent of households. Delivery sales

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Speaker 2: at Walmart are up fifty percent over the last year.

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Speaker 2: Target isn't quite as aggressive, but delivery times are nearly

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Speaker 2: a day far than a year ago. It actually purchased

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Speaker 2: a delivery company company in twenty seventeen for this very reason. Overall,

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Speaker 2: they're just saying that we can compete now on service,

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Speaker 2: not just price.

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Speaker 1: All right, there we go, the top five business stories

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Speaker 1: in five minutes.

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Speaker 2: Thank you Sean, Thank you Michael.

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Speaker 1: It is Thursday, the fifth of December twenty twenty four.

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Speaker 1: Remember to hit follow on the podcast. If five minutes

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Speaker 1: the Property Pendulum, which is our podcast that we do

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Speaker 1: with Domain this week looking at these seven steps to

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Speaker 1: property Nirvana, everything that we would fix with property in

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Speaker 1: Australia well worth a listening. I'm Michael Thompson and that

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Speaker 1: was the Fast five Business News by Fear and Greed.

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Speaker 1: Had a great day.