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Speaker 1: Welcome to Fear and Greed business news you can use today.

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Speaker 1: A growing number of service stations are running out of fuel,

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Speaker 1: as the agricultural sector warns about a critical lack of

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Speaker 1: fertilizer due to the Middle East conflict. Meta and Google's

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Speaker 1: YouTube found liable in a landmark social media addiction trial.

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Speaker 1: And a new study shows five commercial products account for

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Speaker 1: thirty one percent of all deaths globally. Plus, the federal

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Speaker 1: government supports an above inflation wage increase for minimum wage

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Speaker 1: workers and quantuses earnings set to be hammered by rising

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Speaker 1: fuel costs. It is Friday, the twenty seventh of March

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty six. I'm Michael Thompson and good morning Sean Aylmer.

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Speaker 1: Good morning, Michael, Sean. The main story this morning, the

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Speaker 1: fuel crunch, is now the story pretty much shaping everything

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Speaker 1: else in Australian politics and business. The Prime Minister has

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Speaker 1: called another national Cabinet meeting for Monday as shortage is

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Speaker 1: spread and prices surge. Close to five hundred service stations

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Speaker 1: now have run out of at least one fuel type,

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Speaker 1: and the flow on effects are hitting freight, waste collection,

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Speaker 1: other essential services. Agriculture is the latest sector now to

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Speaker 1: be put on notice with supplies of fertilizer set to

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Speaker 1: run short within weeks. That's potentially hitting crops. Of course,

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Speaker 1: Peak Group grain growers yesterday warned of serious ramifications for

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Speaker 1: Australia's grain harvest. Vegetable growers are also reporting fertilizer shortages,

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Speaker 1: with shipments halted because of the effective closure of the

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Speaker 1: Strait of Hamuz.

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Speaker 2: I think the political pressure is on because the public

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Speaker 2: can sede in real time. Diesel is the pinch point. Trucks, tradees, councils,

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Speaker 2: agriculture all run on it, and once diesel supply gets tight,

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Speaker 2: you quickly move from price pain to basically things not

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Speaker 2: turning up. This is both a consumer story and an

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Speaker 2: economic content nuity story. If enough phrase delayed, you do

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Speaker 2: not just pay more at the bowser, you start paying

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Speaker 2: more at the checkout. It is escalating.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, there's also greater internal frustration within government about communications,

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Speaker 1: with the recognition that the public needs clearer, more consistent

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Speaker 1: messaging about what's being done and what might come next

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Speaker 1: as well if the situation deteriorates, because that's certainly what

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Speaker 1: it appears to be. It does appear to be deteriorating.

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Speaker 2: Yes, it definitely does. And governments do not want to

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Speaker 2: say the word rationing unless they absolutely have to, because

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Speaker 2: that does trigger panic. But once the conservation conversation turns

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Speaker 2: to conservation measures, you're heading in that direction. So when

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Speaker 2: we start talking about, you know, more work from home,

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Speaker 2: different delivery schedules, use public transport, reduce non essential driving,

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Speaker 2: it's not that big a step to start talking about rationing.

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Speaker 2: Much of what happens, of course, is out of the

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Speaker 2: government's control. Australia is a price taker. Even if supply

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Speaker 2: is still arriving, the cost has risen and there's nothing

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Speaker 2: we can do about it. Governments are forced to manage

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Speaker 2: the politics the cost of living. That's what the labor

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Speaker 2: governments struggling with at the moment. Also, of course managing

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Speaker 2: the actually the physical supply risk.

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Speaker 1: Now, Sean, this is basically this is where federal state

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Speaker 1: dynamics get pretty messy, right, And I suppose that's the

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Speaker 1: importance of having National Cabinet and why there'll be a

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Speaker 1: meeting next week because the Commonwealth can talk about national settings,

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Speaker 1: but it's actually the states that manage a lot of

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Speaker 1: the on the ground response. If the premiers start kind

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Speaker 1: of shooting from the hip, freelancing on kind of what

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Speaker 1: they think should be done, you get really mixed messages.

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Speaker 1: Mixed messages create panic buying, and that's how a supply issue,

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Speaker 1: without being over dramatic, becomes a stampede.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, basically, the business community is watching closely because any

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Speaker 2: repeat of that COVID era of patchwork approach could be very,

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Speaker 2: very damaging. If Monday's national cabinet can land a consistent

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Speaker 2: national approach that will calm expectations, that will reduce hoarding behavior.

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Speaker 2: Of course, the broader economic implication in all this is inflation.

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Speaker 2: Fuel is everywhere in the economy, transport energy second amount

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Speaker 2: effects on prices. That's why this story bleeds straight into

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Speaker 2: interest rates, wages, business confidence. What's going on at the

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Speaker 2: moment in terms of petrol prices, in terms of how

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Speaker 2: that plays out in the economy, is easily the biggest

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Speaker 2: story of the Australian economy this year, without a doubt,

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Speaker 2: far bigger than interest rates, far more important than interest rates,

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Speaker 2: and potentially far longer lasting.

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Speaker 1: And because that's the thing that this could actually even

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Speaker 1: if the conflict was to be resolved in the coming days,

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Speaker 1: supply takes a long time to come back online, and

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Speaker 1: everything will take a long time to get back to normal,

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Speaker 1: and by which time price presses are already starting to

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Speaker 1: flow through.

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Speaker 2: Right, I mean it takes months. If you're looking for

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Speaker 2: fertilizer that's going through the Strait of Hormuz and it's stopped,

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Speaker 2: and suddenly you know you're planning a crop, you need

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Speaker 2: fertilizer now, or let's say you need it in six weeks.

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Speaker 2: Even if the conflicts stopped tomorrow, I'm not sure you'd

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Speaker 2: actually have that fertilizer.

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Speaker 1: No, No, Now, it's a day by day thing, right,

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Speaker 1: Like this is changing hour by hour, really, so we'll

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Speaker 1: just we'll just have to keep monitoring it. Sewan. The

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Speaker 1: local share market yesterday ended down slightly, just to touch

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Speaker 1: down to eighty five and twenty six points after Iran

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Speaker 1: reportedly rejected a fifteen point piece plan offered by the

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Speaker 1: US and instead issued its own demands for de escalating

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Speaker 1: the conflict, including reparations for damage and recognition of its

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Speaker 1: sovereignty over the Strait.

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Speaker 2: Of hermus Good luck with that one, lady. Yesterday, Donald Trump,

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Speaker 2: after all that came out, Donald Trump said Iran's leaders

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Speaker 2: were afraid to admit that they were negotiating with the US.

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Speaker 1: Look, good luck faring this out, investors.

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Speaker 2: What chance have you got? I don't know. Brent raised

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Speaker 2: two one hundred and four US dollars a barrel yesterday.

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Speaker 2: That helped the energy stocks among the large cass not

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Speaker 2: a lot going on apart from Woodside and Santas. CSL

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Speaker 2: did pretty well. Big banks with mixed retailers and miners

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Speaker 2: also mixed tech indecks underperformed. But really, you know, markets

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Speaker 2: are moving on headlines, and the headlines are going from

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Speaker 2: one side expect to the other really really quickly. It's

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Speaker 2: very difficult to draw a sensible line through any of it, Sean.

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Speaker 1: If you want something that's a bit of a change

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Speaker 1: of pace but still with an investing sensible line though

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Speaker 1: with an investing theme, never sensible And I'm involved, Sean.

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Speaker 1: This is an interview after the show. It's coming up

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Speaker 1: Fearing Greek Q and A today with Stefan von Imoff

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Speaker 1: from alts dot Co. And we are talking about shipwrecks.

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Speaker 1: And you know that the San Jose, the twenty shipwreck

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Speaker 1: of Columbia. Yeah, exactly. But it is the fact that

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Speaker 1: this maritime recovery is kind of moving from kind of

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Speaker 1: treasure hunters to an actual investible industry. Now cool, it

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Speaker 1: is really cool. It is good fun. It's coming up

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Speaker 1: after the show. We've still got a lot more to

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Speaker 1: get through first though. Shawn back in a moment with

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Speaker 1: the rest of the day's business news, Shawn. The federal

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Speaker 1: government has signaled support for an above inflation pay rise

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Speaker 1: for minimum wage and award reliant workers in its submission

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Speaker 1: to the Fair Work Commissioned Annual Wage Review. Workplace Relations

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Speaker 1: Minister Amanda Rishworth described the goal as an economically sustainable

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Speaker 1: real wage increase, although the government didn't put a figure

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Speaker 1: on the proposed increase.

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Speaker 2: Inflation is running at just hundred four percent. It's rising

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Speaker 2: in the back of a higher oil prices. Of course,

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Speaker 2: Treaty modelings warned inflation could push above five percent under

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Speaker 2: a prolonged high oil price scenario. So that suggests the

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Speaker 2: government's looking at at least four percent, possibly four and

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Speaker 2: a half percent. The actu of course, it's looking for

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Speaker 2: a five percent rise. Business groups one to three and

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Speaker 2: a half percent rise. Now, this sort of collision point

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Speaker 2: between politics and inflation is really being seen in this

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Speaker 2: minimum wage fight cost of living pressure is real. Fuel

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Speaker 2: makes it worse, but wages are also one of the

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Speaker 2: channels that can turn a one off price shock into

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Speaker 2: persistent inflation, and the government's trying to work its way

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Speaker 2: down the middle of that. Support low paid workers on

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Speaker 2: one hand, but don't pour petrol on the inflation fire.

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Speaker 2: Sorry about the pun there. Commission will be watching the budget,

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Speaker 2: the next inflation prints and evidence of business capacity to

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Speaker 2: pay before making its decision, probably in June.

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Speaker 1: Still in politics, Australia and Germany will look to host

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Speaker 1: each other's militaries as European nations aim to reduce their

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Speaker 1: dependence on the US as an ally.

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Speaker 2: Yesterday, Defense Minister Richard Miles and German counterpart Boris Pistorius

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Speaker 2: said they would pursue a status of forces agreement. Miles

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Speaker 2: said the legal framework for the stationing of military personnel

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Speaker 2: would make it easier to operate from each other's countries.

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Speaker 1: There are some names that you just slow down and

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Speaker 1: tread very carefully as you go. It's Boris Pistorius is

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Speaker 1: one of those. Quantas Sean could see a sharp hit

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Speaker 1: to earnings if the conflict driven fuel shop persists. We

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Speaker 1: talked before about just the fact that this is flowing

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Speaker 1: through to every single part of the economy. Aviation is

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Speaker 1: a very kind of a very exposed sector. Modeling by

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Speaker 1: its former chief economists suggest that earnings from flying could

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Speaker 1: fall to around five hundred and forty four million dollars

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Speaker 1: this financial year in a prolonged conflict scenario versus earlier

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Speaker 1: forecasts above one point one billion dollars. Tony Weber is

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Speaker 1: now an aviation industry consultant. He warned that even if

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Speaker 1: planes were full and faares rows, the fuel bill could

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Speaker 1: move faster than revenue. According to the Financial Review, some

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Speaker 1: carriers globally have already cut schedules. Quantus has started reducing

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Speaker 1: some Jetstar flights to New Zealand, citing of course those higher.

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Speaker 2: Costs, But it's also redirecting larger aircraft from the US

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Speaker 2: to meet demand for Europe flights. So they've got a

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Speaker 2: few levers to pull here. Quantus will fly larger Boeing

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Speaker 2: seven eight seven aircraft from Perth to Rome daily. That's

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Speaker 2: up from three times a week. It's going to fly

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Speaker 2: Sydney to Parasfire, Singapore five times a week now. Airlines

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Speaker 2: basically leverage plays on fuel prices in demand and fuel spikes,

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Speaker 2: they try to pass it on. Always a lag there.

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Speaker 2: There's also a limit because eventually people just stop flying

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Speaker 2: when the price goes up too much. One advantage Quantus

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Speaker 2: has a big business demand in key roots, which can

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Speaker 2: be relatively inelastic for a while, so it takes a

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Speaker 2: fair bat for that to change. But if this becomes

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Speaker 2: a physical fuel conservation problem, there's not enough fuel around

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Speaker 2: forget the price, well, then you know conners can't fly planes.

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Speaker 2: It's share price film more than two percent. Yesterday?

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Speaker 1: Did you just use the word inelastic?

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Speaker 2: I did? I apologize. I said in elastic, and then

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Speaker 2: I thought, I feel like I'm back up macro one

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Speaker 2: level macro one oh one oh.

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Speaker 1: Gully, like you do. Just sometimes you just you go

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Speaker 1: full economists sometimes.

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Speaker 2: Last weekend, last Saturday night, I went to sixtieth birthday

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Speaker 2: party and a guy called Rory Robertson who's very well

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Speaker 2: known in the economics world, and he ended up with

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Speaker 2: three current or former Reserve Bank governors at the party,

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Speaker 2: two current or former heads of Treasury. One of the abs.

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Speaker 2: That's a pretty well connected dude.

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Speaker 1: God Ie would have been dropping terms like inelastic everywhere

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Speaker 1: and would have been cool, cool for doing it right.

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Speaker 2: Well, I've got it. I mean, it was a fantastic

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Speaker 2: party and it was Look, it was very different to

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Speaker 2: an economics classroom. I will tell you.

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Speaker 1: That, and I reckon, you can't say much more. I'm

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Speaker 1: guessing let's move on all right. Westpac has flagged higher

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Speaker 1: costs for its technology simplification program, known as Unite, as

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Speaker 1: it tries to bring its mortgage systems onto a single platform.

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Speaker 1: The expected cost of creating a single mortgage technology system

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Speaker 1: has risen to two hundred and eighty five million dollars,

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Speaker 1: up from two hundred and sixty five million that have

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Speaker 1: been projected last November. This sits inside a much bigger,

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Speaker 1: a much broader, four year, three and a half billion

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Speaker 1: dollars simplification program. Westpac says it's migrating customers from a

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Speaker 1: smaller bank brands think at Saint Saint George Bank, a

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Speaker 1: Bank of Melbourne, onto the main Westpac back end system

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Speaker 1: and it expects to deliver savings down the track once

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Speaker 1: the work is done. But my god, that's a heck

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Speaker 1: of a lot of work to get there.

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Speaker 2: These sound boring, I get that, but they're really really important.

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Speaker 2: They're fundamental to pricing, managing, risk, compliance, customer service. If

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Speaker 2: you can get all that right, you can cut costic

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Speaker 2: can move faster. If you get it wrong, wow, you

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Speaker 2: can have a pr disaster very quickly. Now. Unite is

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Speaker 2: Westpac's big modernization program under the relatively new CEO, Anthony Miller.

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Speaker 2: It should have been done before, never was. He has

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Speaker 2: taken good on him and good luck to him. The

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Speaker 2: market is a bit skeptical because the benefits are really

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Speaker 2: long dated. You've got to spend all this money up

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Speaker 2: front and hopefully you get the benefits down the line.

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Speaker 2: Of course, there's execution complexity in all of this. Good

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Speaker 2: luck to Westpac for doing it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and it all sounds very inelastic.

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Speaker 2: It does my very in elastic some of that stuff.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to just keep practicing dropping that one until

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Speaker 1: it just happens naturally. Sure. Turning to international news now,

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Speaker 1: a US jury has found Meta and Google's YouTube liable

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Speaker 1: in a landmark social media addiction trial. This is a

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Speaker 1: big one. The case was brought by a young woman

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Speaker 1: who said addictive design harmed her mental health. The verdict

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Speaker 1: could have significant implications for many similar lawsuits. The jury

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Speaker 1: found negligence in the design of the platforms, failure to warn,

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Speaker 1: and that the products caused substantial harm. Essentially, the jury

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Speaker 1: said Meta, which owns Instagram, Facebook, on WhatsApp, and Google

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Speaker 1: intentionally built addictive social media platforms.

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Speaker 2: So there's all sorts of sort of barb wires on

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Speaker 2: this one. Big legal risk once one plane of winds

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Speaker 2: becomes easy for others to follow, big business model risk

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Speaker 2: for these social all these tech platforms. If courts start

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Speaker 2: trading engagement design like a product liability issue, then companies

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Speaker 2: may need to change features that drive time on platform,

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Speaker 2: which is about how they make money. Also, very political

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Speaker 2: regulators in multiple countries, including Australia have been circling this

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Speaker 2: space for years. A big jury verdict gives politicians covered

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Speaker 2: a push harder, gives investors in a new set of

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Speaker 2: risk questions to price. Not Surprisingly, both companies said they

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Speaker 2: would appeal the decision.

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Speaker 1: Mentioned this next one at the top of the show

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Speaker 1: shown five commercial products fossil fuels, ultra processed foods, chemicals, alcohol,

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Speaker 1: and tobacco are linked to nearly one third of deaths

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Speaker 1: each year. A slightly provocative new paper in the world's

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Speaker 1: top ranked Yeah, this is in the top ranked medical journal,

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Speaker 1: though right, so it's got some credibility to The findings

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Speaker 1: have resulted in an international research team led by a

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Speaker 1: Sydney scientist accusing companies of concealing data and influencing governments

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Speaker 1: to benefit their bottom line while contributing to a massive

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Speaker 1: increasing chronic diseases. Some of these diseases include cancers, diabetes,

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Speaker 1: neuro degenerative conditions, which account for seventy four percent of

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Speaker 1: global mortality.

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Speaker 2: According to nine Media. The findings were published in the

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Speaker 2: New England Journal of Medicine, basically the Bible of medical research.

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Speaker 2: Of the five products, fossil fuels, which includes plastics manufacturing

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Speaker 2: accounted or accounts for more than eight million deaths per year.

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Speaker 2: Next in line tobacca seven point two million deaths. Then

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Speaker 2: it drops down to ultras processed foods at two point

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Speaker 2: three million, chemicals in commas and in pesticides at about

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Speaker 2: one point eight million, and alcohols about the same level.

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Speaker 2: There's an additional six hundred thousand deaths per year attributed

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Speaker 2: to drug use, primarily opioids, and lead author Dotor Nicholas Charters,

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Speaker 2: a corporate harm researcher at the University of Sydney, so

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Speaker 2: The paper underwent unusually comprehensive legal and scientific vetting before

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Speaker 2: the New England Journal of Medicine agreed to publish it.

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Speaker 2: I'm sure that is true. The findings thirty one percent

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Speaker 2: come from five commercial products. It is pretty extraordinary.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it certainly is. All right, Sean. That almost wraps

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Speaker 1: us up. This is where we would normally say goodbye,

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Speaker 1: but not today.

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Speaker 2: That's right today again Fear and Greeds Accelerated Series with

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Speaker 2: air Wallas, where we explore what it takes for businesses

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Speaker 2: to grow with out borders and why having a what

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Speaker 2: next mindset can be your competitive advantage. I'm looking forward

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Speaker 2: to this one. Ross Fastucca is the CEO of Webjet

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Speaker 2: Business Travel and air Wallos Customer. They use a platform

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Speaker 2: to streamline financial operations and expand their product capabilities as

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Speaker 2: they scale. Ross Welcome to Fear and Greeds Accelerated Series.

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Speaker 3: Sank Sean, Nice to be How.

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Speaker 2: Exactly what is Webjet Business Travel?

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Speaker 1: What are you solving for?

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Speaker 3: Mojet Business Traveler is a technology lad business travel platform

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Speaker 3: for full service to provide businesses the ability for them

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Speaker 3: to book, manage, and control all of their trouble programs

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Speaker 3: all the way from your simple booking through to your

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Speaker 3: complex booking requiring assistance with concier service in live chat, reporting,

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Speaker 3: online policy management. But you know, really the main thing

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Speaker 3: for us is that it is technology first and really

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Speaker 3: heavily serviced backed.

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Speaker 2: We talk about restlessness as a competitive advantage. It's the

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Speaker 2: idea that things are never quite good enough. I'm interested

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Speaker 2: how that evolved at Loco Mode, which of course is

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Speaker 2: the engine behind the business which is now owned by

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Speaker 2: Webjet Business Travel bringing Locomote together. What did that look

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Speaker 2: like in practice, never being quite happy with you what

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Speaker 2: you had and always striving for something more.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, look, I think that's the story of my life.

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Speaker 3: I'm sure very calm with entrepreneurs, that's it's never good enough.

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Speaker 3: So for me, really it was around you know how

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Speaker 3: the problem even formed, you know, looking at the industry

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Speaker 3: way back in twenty twelve when we started the business,

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Speaker 3: we just found this massive gap and back then it

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Speaker 3: was not good enough, you know, what was being delivered

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Speaker 3: to a customer as a solution in market. So I

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Speaker 3: think it's just an innate thing built in, you know,

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Speaker 3: in myself and the team that every time you look

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Speaker 3: at a problem and every time you see a solution

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Speaker 3: out there. I think our whole team and our de

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Speaker 3: sources that's never good enough, so we always got to

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Speaker 3: make it better and that really was the thing that

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Speaker 3: paved the way for us and our success in locomot.

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Speaker 2: And that technology is Locomote, which you were part of founding.

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Speaker 3: Is that right correct? Yeah? You know, Locomote was born

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Speaker 3: in twenty twelve out of a frustration that we had

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Speaker 3: around the way business travel was managed and real We

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Speaker 3: believe that technology was a way to deliver a solution,

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Speaker 3: and you know that's the birth of Webjet business travel

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Speaker 3: came off the back of all the work that we

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Speaker 3: did a locomate.

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Speaker 2: Okay, so this whole idea of restlessness as a competitive advantage,

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Speaker 2: the idea that things are never quite good enough. You've

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Speaker 2: mentioned loco Mate, you started in twenty twelve. What does

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Speaker 2: that look like in practice inside an organization.

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Speaker 3: I think it's really around the culture that you build.

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Speaker 3: Like entrepreneurial organizations, I fear have a have a culture

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Speaker 3: of you know, we always need to make the next

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Speaker 3: thing we do better. And you know, we're very much

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Speaker 3: practice a continuous improvement environment here without staff and culture,

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Speaker 3: so making sure that everything that we do is one

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Speaker 3: step better every day and just focusing on what are

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Speaker 3: the real problems that we're solving, how are they solved?

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Speaker 3: But how can we solve it in a unique and

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Speaker 3: you know, technically driven way. On our side as well.

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Speaker 2: You talk about culture, what do you do? I mean

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Speaker 2: when you're company here, it's a mile stone, might be earnings,

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Speaker 2: it might be a product launcher, funding around how do

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Speaker 2: you mark that and how do you make sure people

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Speaker 2: then don't just rest on their laurels.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, look, I think we have a high performance culture.

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Speaker 3: We really have built this over time where you know,

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Speaker 3: we celebrate quickly and then we just get on with it.

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Speaker 3: It's quite an interesting dynamic, but I feel that we

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Speaker 3: have a high level of trust. So and everybody's really

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Speaker 3: mission driven. You know, we see the problems out there

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Speaker 3: in the world and having that mission driven or that

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Speaker 3: all star that everyone's trying to go after sometimes even

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Speaker 3: unattainable goal. But it's really exciting that the team enjoys

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Speaker 3: being able to chase something that is quite difficult to solve,

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Speaker 3: and that the travel industry is an industry that's quite

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Speaker 3: difficult to solve for all the problems. But you know,

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Speaker 3: so the team just moves on as they complete a task,

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Speaker 3: straight onto the next one.

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Speaker 2: As you move on. Have you ever found yourself disrupting?

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Speaker 2: Maybe it's your own product, maybe it's your own district,

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Speaker 2: distribution model, your own pricing even.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely. You know, we're quite unique in terms of

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Speaker 3: the way we offer pricing and the actual whole solution.

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Speaker 3: You know, we really want to be technology driven. You know,

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Speaker 3: we've got a really strong focus. Sometimes we can be

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Speaker 3: misunderstood as only technology, but service quality is really important

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Speaker 3: to us and to our customers. We just try to

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Speaker 3: deliver that in a very technical way, right, so enabling

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Speaker 3: people to use and leverage the technology to get a

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Speaker 3: greater level of service to really you know, work with

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Speaker 3: us in a modern way, a way that we believe,

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Speaker 3: you know, is how business is done now. We used

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Speaker 3: to try to convince people back in the early days

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Speaker 3: that online was important, and now everyone just expects it

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Speaker 3: and so we're really well placed to deliver that for them.

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Speaker 2: Ross, thank you for joining the Accelerator Series.

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Speaker 3: Thanksean.

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Speaker 2: That was Ross FASTUCA CEO or Webjet Business Travel. I'm

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Speaker 2: Sean Ail Matt and this is the Accelerator Series brought

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Speaker 2: to you by airwallt's Build the Future. Visit airblux dot

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Speaker 2: com to find out more.