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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Fear and Greed Business News Afternoon Report

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Speaker 1: for Friday, the twenty seventh of February twenty twenty six.

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Speaker 1: O'hm Michael Thompson and every afternoon, we've got the five

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Speaker 1: stories that happened today that you need to know about.

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Speaker 1: Let's go with story number one. It is about markets.

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Speaker 1: The S and PA sex two hundred rows zero point

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Speaker 1: three percent today to nine thousand, one hundred and ninety

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Speaker 1: nine points, a fresh record close for the third straight day.

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Speaker 1: The market is finishing the month up three point seven percent.

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Speaker 1: That's its strongest gain in ten months and comes off

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Speaker 1: the back of a very volatile reporting season. The best

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Speaker 1: performer today was Block, the owner of after Pay. We'll

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Speaker 1: have a bit more on that one a little bit

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Speaker 1: later on, but it saw twenty eight percent today on

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Speaker 1: a jump in profit and some huge job cuts. Consumer

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Speaker 1: staples lagged. Colds fell more than seven percent after a

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Speaker 1: softer sales growth, disappointed investors. Woollies was off about one

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Speaker 1: percent after its best one day jump. Yeah, yes today

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Speaker 1: in thirty years. A soft day two for the banks.

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Speaker 1: But materials well and truly outperformed, with Linus Rare Earth

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Speaker 1: jumping more than ten percent. I Luka resources up more

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Speaker 1: than nine percent. This is all on renewed optimism around

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Speaker 1: rare earths. The Financial Review reports that that optimism is

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Speaker 1: largely because of a US company called MP Materials signing

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Speaker 1: a deal with an unidentified an unidentified auto maker. That's

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Speaker 1: a mouthful, but the supply contract is described as enormous. Now,

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Speaker 1: if that's not enough to stoke a bit of optimism,

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Speaker 1: I don't know what is. Story number two. The Federal

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Speaker 1: Liberal Party will not release the official review into the

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Speaker 1: coalition's twenty twenty five election defeat, despite earlier expectations that

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Speaker 1: at least the recommendations might be made public. The review,

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Speaker 1: which was conducted by Nick Minchin and Prue Goward, reportedly

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Speaker 1: criticized campaign strategy and key policy decisions. Former leader Peter

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Speaker 1: Dunton had campaigned for it not to be Relat East

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Speaker 1: the coalition suffered its worst result, obviously by vote share,

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Speaker 1: at the May election last year, reduced to just forty

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Speaker 1: three lower House seats while Labor secured ninety four. It

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Speaker 1: is a normal part of the process to conduct a

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Speaker 1: review of what went wrong, but the party said today

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Speaker 1: that it accepted the decisive defeat and would focus now

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Speaker 1: on rebuilding and restoring voter trust rather than publishing the review.

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Speaker 1: The decision comes on the same day as former Opposition

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Speaker 1: leader Susan Lee formally resigned from Parliament, ending a twenty

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Speaker 1: five year career, triggering a by election now in her

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Speaker 1: regional New South Wales seat of Farrer. In a statement,

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Speaker 1: Lee somewhat pointedly noted that policy decisions adopted by her successor,

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Speaker 1: Angus Taylor did in fact mirror the directions that she

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Speaker 1: was setting herself during her nine months as leader. Story

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Speaker 1: number three Back to Markets was the last official day

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Speaker 1: of earning season and a few companies still reporting results today.

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Speaker 1: I mentioned Colds before. Harvey Norman fell nine percent after

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Speaker 1: its local sales came in below expectations, despite a stronger

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Speaker 1: showing from its international stores. TPG Telecom was off almost

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Speaker 1: three percent. Competition is heating up in the mobile market,

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Speaker 1: but the telco reported a return to profit almost fifty

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Speaker 1: three million dollars for the half year. The property exchange

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Speaker 1: platform PEXA was up nearly five percent after delivering a

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Speaker 1: profit that far exceeded expectations, and Virgin Australia was off

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Speaker 1: slightly just zero point three percent. Down today after a

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Speaker 1: higher tax expense saw statutory profit drop to three hundred

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Speaker 1: and forty one million dollars and one more company. It

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Speaker 1: didn't report results today, but it did resume trading car

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Speaker 1: parts retailer Bapcorp. Not a great day. It had suspended

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Speaker 1: trading for a capital raising, and when it resumed it

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Speaker 1: fell almost fifty percent today. Ouch story number four. The

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Speaker 1: Corporate Regulator has launched federal court action against the owner

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Speaker 1: of insurer Budget Direct, alleging the overcharge up to thirty

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Speaker 1: nine thousand customers by three point three million dollars over

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Speaker 1: four years. The regulator claims that the insurer promoted discounts

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Speaker 1: of up to thirty percent on car, home and motorbike policies,

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Speaker 1: but removed them when customers made changes like updating their

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Speaker 1: address or replacing a vehicle. ACIK alleges that the company

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Speaker 1: was aware of the issue since twenty sixteen, but failed

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Speaker 1: to fix it or inform customers. Budget Direct parent company

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Speaker 1: Auto in General, though, said that the issue was inadvertent

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Speaker 1: and that it was actually self reported, and that it

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Speaker 1: has refunded more than three point eight million dollars including interest,

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Speaker 1: and invested millions more in system and compliance improvements. ACIK

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Speaker 1: is still seeking penalties despite those refunds, continuing a broader

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Speaker 1: crackdown on misleading insurance pricing practices that have seen action

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Speaker 1: taken against other major insurers in recent years. And finally,

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Speaker 1: story number five after Pay owner Block I mentioned this earlier,

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Speaker 1: will cut forth jobs that's about forty percent of its workforce,

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Speaker 1: with founder Jack Dorsey saying that AI tools have fundamentally

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Speaker 1: changed how companies are built and run. The restructure is

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Speaker 1: expected to cost between four hundred and fifty million and

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Speaker 1: five hundred million US dollars at Dorsey said that recent

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Speaker 1: advances in AI models have marked a turning point, and

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Speaker 1: he is predicting that most companies will make similar structural

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Speaker 1: changes within a year. He said intelligence tools are now

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Speaker 1: capable of being applied to nearly every part of his business.

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Speaker 1: The announcement came as block reported a twenty four percent

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Speaker 1: rise in quarterly gross profit, and as I mentioned, block

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Speaker 1: shares surged in after hours training in the US and

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Speaker 1: locally here on the AX as well. That's it for

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Speaker 1: the Afternoon Report for Friday, the twenty seventh of February.

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Speaker 1: Make sure you're following the podcast and headlong to Fear

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Speaker 1: and Greed dot com dot au to sign up for

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Speaker 1: our free daily newsletter that's on linkin Todays Show Notes

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Speaker 1: as well. I'm Michael Thompson. Enjoy your evening.