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Speaker 1: Bidders come looking for star entertainment, the local share market

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Speaker 1: comes close to a record high, and Prime Minister Anthony

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Speaker 1: Albanezi on high alert over the unrest in New Caledonia.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Fear and Greed, daily business news for people

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Speaker 1: who make their own decisions. It is Tuesday, the twenty

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Speaker 1: first of May twenty twenty four. I'm Michael Thompson and

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Speaker 1: good morning, Sean Aylmer. Good morning Michael, Sean. After the show,

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Speaker 1: you have an interview coming up with He was often

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Speaker 1: one of my favorite guests, I mean, of all the

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Speaker 1: two occasions that he's spoken to us on this podcast.

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Speaker 1: Bruce Walpy a Senior Fellow non Resident at the United

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Speaker 1: States Studies Center.

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Speaker 2: Yes, so Bruce is lovely fella. He is American by birth.

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Speaker 2: He has worked in the Obama administration. He also worked

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Speaker 2: in JULIETT. Gillard's office for a while there as well,

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Speaker 2: so probably telled you where he's leaning is in politics.

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Speaker 2: But he really is an expert on the US political system.

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Speaker 2: So we talked to him about Joe Biden, why no

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Speaker 2: one wants to vote for Joe Biden, Donald Trump, why

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Speaker 2: he can still be successful notwithstanding his different legal woes

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Speaker 2: and in the end, I say, so who's going to win, Bruce,

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Speaker 2: and he lets me know who he thinks it's going

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Speaker 2: to win. So it's a great chat.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it certainly is. It is well worth a listener's

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Speaker 1: coming up after the show. And a quick reminder as well,

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Speaker 1: Sean that tomorrow is Wednesday, which is newsletter day. Fear

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Speaker 1: and Greed newsletter is out every Wednesday morning, comes out

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Speaker 1: mid morning, so you still have time. You still have

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Speaker 1: just over twenty four hours to head along to Fearangreed

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Speaker 1: dot com todau, put your email address in, sign up,

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Speaker 1: get the newsletter every Wednesday, costs you absolutely nothing, and

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Speaker 1: you get in exchange all of Sean's opinions. Really not

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Speaker 1: selling that, am I?

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Speaker 2: No? I do get one thing about the newsletter. I

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Speaker 2: get to say what I think, not just tell the

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Speaker 2: news much more opinion in the newsletter.

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Speaker 1: Do you know yet what you're teeing off in tomorrow's newsletter?

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Speaker 2: I got some ideas. Just get that to myself.

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Speaker 1: Okay, well you're really teasing us with this, So head

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Speaker 1: along to Fearangreed dot com tod au and sign up

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Speaker 1: for the newsletter. It is going to be well worth it.

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Speaker 1: To hear Sean's unleashed opinions on a whole bunch of topics,

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Speaker 1: but on with the show, Seawan the main story this morning.

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Speaker 1: Star Entertainment is considering an approach from a group of

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Speaker 1: investors led by hard Rock Hotels and Resorts, which might

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Speaker 1: provide a last minute lifeline to the ailing gaming company.

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Speaker 2: Star share price jumped eighteen percent yesterday after it confirmed

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Speaker 2: it had received inbound interest. It's howlp put it from

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Speaker 2: several parties regarding potential transactions, one of which included hard

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Speaker 2: Rock Hotel and Resorts. Under the proposal, Star would be

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Speaker 2: rebranded hard Rock. According to the Financial Review, the Florida

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Speaker 2: based hard Rock operates more than a dozen casinos, including

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Speaker 2: The Mirage in Las Vegas. The Star operates in Sydney,

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Speaker 2: Brisbane and the Gold Coast, and of course, is in

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Speaker 2: the midst of a second inquiry into whether it should

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Speaker 2: keep its license in home state of New South Wales.

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Speaker 2: The company could be stripped of that license and therefore

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Speaker 2: it won't be able to operate its gaming flaws in

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Speaker 2: New South Wales or Queensland. It also faces a fine

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Speaker 2: from Ostrak, which is accused Star of serious and systemic

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Speaker 2: non compliance with anti money laundering laws. Stars released a

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Speaker 2: statement yesterday that said the inquiries thus far haven't resulted

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Speaker 2: in substantive discussions.

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Speaker 1: Seanan, I suppose the big question is if hard Rock

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Speaker 1: or some other large gaming group got involved, doesn't have

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Speaker 1: to be hard Rock, would that improve Star's chance of

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Speaker 1: actually kind of holding on to its license.

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Speaker 2: It's a bit hard to say, but helping is the

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Speaker 2: fact that the US based gaming groups such as hard

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Speaker 2: Rock have already gone through fairly rigorous vetting in their

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Speaker 2: home country, and you'd hope that they would have practices

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Speaker 2: and processes in place to address some of the issues

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Speaker 2: that Star is facing. Certainly, if you want to buy

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Speaker 2: a casino in Australia, now is a pretty good time

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Speaker 2: to do it. Before yesterday, Star was trading the year

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Speaker 2: all time lows, and while it had a market capitalization

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Speaker 2: of will over a billion dollars, it's about one and

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Speaker 2: a half billion dollars after yesterday's big jump in its

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Speaker 2: share price. It is still a high risk proposition. It

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Speaker 2: still faces big questions over whether it will get its

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Speaker 2: license back. There's the potential for those big fines, so

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Speaker 2: the purchase cost could well be well below one billion dollars.

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Speaker 2: I mean some analysts are talking about half a billion dollars. Hence,

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Speaker 2: if you want to pick up and take on that risk,

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Speaker 2: it's probably a pretty cheap asset at the moment. Also,

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Speaker 2: if you think about Crown Resorts, it's owned by a

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Speaker 2: private equity group, Blackstone. It cut a thousand jobs across

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Speaker 2: its three casinos earlier in the month. Times are a

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Speaker 2: bit tough for the industry, so quite apart from the

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Speaker 2: licensing issues, the anti money laundering issues, it's also just

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Speaker 2: not a great environment at the moment for gaming companies.

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Speaker 2: What I suppace this really does show is that there

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Speaker 2: is a way out of this current mess for Star

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Speaker 2: that isn't it trading its own way out? I mean

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Speaker 2: a purchase from one of these big guys, particularly if

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Speaker 2: you brought the hard rock name to Sydney, could make

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Speaker 2: a real difference. So I think this is going to

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Speaker 2: be fascinating to watch. Obviously it's fairly early in these talks,

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Speaker 2: but you know, where there's smoke, Michael, there tends to

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Speaker 2: be fire.

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Speaker 1: And Sean, it is just another chapter, isn't it In

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Speaker 1: what has been The Star story has just been remarkable

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Speaker 1: to watch over the last few years in terms of

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Speaker 1: all of the money laundering allegations and the organized crime

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Speaker 1: and all and the inquiries and the ongoing saga. And

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Speaker 1: here we have kind of the hard rock and the

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Speaker 1: potential for one of those giant guitars to be mounted

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Speaker 1: on top of the Star casino in Sydney. Wouldn't that

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Speaker 1: be amazing?

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Speaker 2: Exactly? I remember some time when I was a child,

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Speaker 2: he says, I was probably a teenager, and the hard

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Speaker 2: Rock opened in Sydney, I think it was, And it

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Speaker 2: was one of those streets in East Sydney, and there

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Speaker 2: was a big guitar and I remember coming down from

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Speaker 2: the country and as a family went for a drive

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Speaker 2: past the hard Rock to see it. We're so excited

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Speaker 2: that the hard rock had come to Australia. I don't

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Speaker 2: know when that was, and it obviously didn't work no

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Speaker 2: longer there, but one of my great early memories of

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Speaker 2: a childhood.

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Speaker 1: It is really quite iconic. I just think it's it's

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Speaker 1: exciting and it does it actually brings a bit of

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Speaker 1: kind of almost celebrity now to the story that just

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Speaker 1: keeps on giving.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree, all right.

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Speaker 1: Turning to local markets, what happened yesterday.

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Speaker 2: The local share market moved within twenty three points of

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Speaker 2: its record high yesterday, touching eight hundred and seventy four

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Speaker 2: points before finishing up just over half percent for the day.

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Speaker 2: Now so it closed a eight hundred and sixty three

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Speaker 2: point seven points. That means it's thirty three points off

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Speaker 2: its record close, which is seven eight nine six point

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Speaker 2: four point and all that almost at a peak. The

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Speaker 2: energy and material sectors were the best performers, with BHP,

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Speaker 2: Santos and Woodside all closing up around two percent, while

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Speaker 2: are Tinto finished three percent higher. The rally and the

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Speaker 2: miners came amid a big jump in metals prices. More

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Speaker 2: on that shortly. The gold stocks also did well, with

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Speaker 2: Evolution Mining, Goal, Road Resources and Regis performing well. The

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Speaker 2: laggards including CSL, West Farmers, Goodman Group, Woolli's Transurban, Weistech Global,

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Speaker 2: and Telstra's feel Bad saying that I'm like, yes, that

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Speaker 2: was just a good day in the market. So I

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Speaker 2: then go and list all these poor performers, Michael, But

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Speaker 2: generally things are pretty good. Yesterday.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah's let's give kind of credit where credit is due.

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Speaker 1: The market did pretty well. It did do very well,

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Speaker 1: absolutely international markets. What's happening there.

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Speaker 2: Markets in the local region basically benefiting from stimulus measures

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Speaker 2: in China to prop up the ailing property market. Beijing

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Speaker 2: removed the floor on mortgage rates and encouraged local governments

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Speaker 2: to buy homes to convert them into affordable housing. We

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Speaker 2: talked about that late last week. It's helped markets more generally,

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Speaker 2: certainly the big miners on the back of stronger line

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Speaker 2: ore prices, but other medals have risen as well. Copper

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Speaker 2: hit a new record yesterday of eight and forty eight

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Speaker 2: US dollars a ton, beating the previous high setback in

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Speaker 2: March twenty twenty two. Nickel surged seven percent. That's following

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Speaker 2: the outbreak of riots in New Caledonia. New Caledonia is

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Speaker 2: actually a key supplier of nickel and the region golden

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Speaker 2: new record four and fifty nine US sense announce that's

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Speaker 2: on the back of hopes and interest rates in the

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Speaker 2: US are on the way down. The as a dollar

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Speaker 2: is buying around sixty seven US cents. It's a lot

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Speaker 2: of movement in markets.

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Speaker 1: Yesterday, I had no idea about New Caledonia and.

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Speaker 2: Nicol No, Noah did I until yesterday.

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Speaker 1: I know We'll talk more about New Caledonia shortly. But

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Speaker 1: I've learned something.

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Speaker 2: I don't mean Nicol at the moment is not a

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Speaker 2: great commodity to be an exporter off because there's the

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Speaker 2: fun of it on the market and its prices have

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Speaker 2: really come off still. I mean got a bump yesterday.

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Speaker 1: Okay, all right, there is a bit to get through today, Sean.

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Speaker 1: We'll be back in a moment with the rest of

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Speaker 1: the day's business news. Sean. Prime Minister Anthony Abnezi says

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Speaker 1: the Australian Defense Force is ready to fly in to

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Speaker 1: rescue hundreds of Australians who were trapped in New Caledonia

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Speaker 1: amid riots when it is permitted to do so.

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Speaker 2: Violent protests have broken out in the French controls South

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Speaker 2: Pacific Territory amid plans to change voting rules, with at

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Speaker 2: least six people killed and many others injured. There are

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Speaker 2: three hundred Australians registered with the Department of Foreign Affairs

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Speaker 2: and Trade who want to leave the island after the

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Speaker 2: international airport was closed and roads were blockaded by authorities.

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Speaker 2: According to report in the Australian Missra, Albernizi urged those

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Speaker 2: needing rescue to contact a twenty four hour emergency support line,

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Speaker 2: and said troops were actively waiting to provide assistance once

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Speaker 2: they're granted access into the territory. That's the key point there.

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Speaker 2: Missrailbernesi said Australia had been in contact with New Zealand

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Speaker 2: to discuss next steps for citizens who are trapped in

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Speaker 2: the territory, and flagged that Air Force planes were waiting

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Speaker 2: on standby.

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Speaker 1: Agribusiness Elders has announced its worst profit in a decade

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Speaker 1: after farmers sold off cattle herds fearful of extended hot

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Speaker 1: and dry conditions.

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Speaker 2: Elder's profit fell seventy six percent to under twelve million

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Speaker 2: dollars for the six months to the end of March,

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Speaker 2: and Boss Mark Allison in part blamed it on an

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Speaker 2: incorrect prediction of El Nino weather conditions. Now, the Bureau

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Speaker 2: of Meteorology last year warned about these conditions and it

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Speaker 2: triggered the sale of livestock. Farmers heard the news, they

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Speaker 2: thought it was going to be hot and dry. I'm

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Speaker 2: going to get rid of my livestock now. Anyway, it

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Speaker 2: didn't really eventuate, but because the farmers didn't have the livestock,

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Speaker 2: they didn't get to elders to buy all their supplies.

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Speaker 2: That's kind of what happened, mister Allison said. The disappointing

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Speaker 2: six months was a one off. Livestock markets have started

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Speaker 2: to recover. Elders, of course, had warned of the profit downgrade,

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Speaker 2: and after yesterday's announcement and mister Allison's comments, the stock

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Speaker 2: actually rose more than one percent.

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Speaker 1: Now, this is an interesting one shown. The share price

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Speaker 1: of Nuix jumped twenty five percent yesterday after the software

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Speaker 1: group said it would beat its target revenue growth of

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Speaker 1: ten percent this financial year.

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Speaker 2: The group surprised everyone with an unscheduled trading update after

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Speaker 2: it said it'd had signed and a multi year contract

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Speaker 2: with an undisclosed customer. Yesterday's surge is some relief from shareholders,

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Speaker 2: but they needed it. They've seen the value of the

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Speaker 2: company for by about seventy percent since listing. Newick's is

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Speaker 2: still awaiting a federal court judgment over allegations by the

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Speaker 2: Australian Securities and Investments Commission that it misled the market

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Speaker 2: in the wake of its IPO. The company denies those claims.

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Speaker 2: We'll hear about that in the next couple of months.

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Speaker 2: Investors yesterday would be somewhat relieved that with some movement

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Speaker 2: in the upwards direction of its share price.

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Speaker 1: Speaking of big moves in share prices, Sean jewelry retailer

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Speaker 1: Michael Hill's share price tumbled twenty three percent yesterday after

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Speaker 1: a warned of a slump in sales.

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Speaker 2: The group said positive sales momentum had been expected through

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Speaker 2: the second half, in line with anticipated improvements and consumer

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Speaker 2: sentiment and economic conditions, but alas that hadn't materialized. While

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Speaker 2: the business in Australia is doing okay, the New Zealand

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Speaker 2: operations are the most challenging. Went on to give a

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Speaker 2: couple of reasons for the decline in sales. I thought

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Speaker 2: they're really fascinating. One of them is a fall in

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Speaker 2: consumer credit approval rates across New Zealand, so people buying

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Speaker 2: jewelry are taking outlines to do it, they're not getting

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Speaker 2: approved for credit, therefore they can't buy. The second one

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Speaker 2: was an increase in serious retail crime events impacting a

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Speaker 2: number of its stores. That fascinating.

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Speaker 1: So what in terms of like shoplifting? I presume so,

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Speaker 1: but everything's under glass.

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Speaker 2: I don't know how they do it.

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Speaker 1: No interespose. It's one of those ones where you go

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Speaker 1: in and say, look, can I try on like five

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Speaker 1: rings at once, find.

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Speaker 2: The most expensive rings in the place.

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Speaker 1: One on each finger, things, and off we go.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: It's just like you know when you're when you're in

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Speaker 1: pal less shoes and you're trying on your shoes and

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Speaker 1: it's taken for a quick walk to test them out.

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Speaker 1: If you never go back take your rings for for.

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Speaker 2: What you do do is leave a lovely pair of

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Speaker 2: old runners that you had for three and a half years.

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Speaker 1: That's a fair trade. It's got a trading.

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Speaker 2: Dear anyway. The chief executive of Michael Hill International, Daniel Bracken,

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Speaker 2: said to consumer discretionary spend and the fine jewelry category

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Speaker 2: in particular remained under pressure due to macroeconomic forces.

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Speaker 1: I just need to make it crystal clear that I

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Speaker 1: have never actually done that.

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Speaker 2: I'm wondering about that. Was that just came, you know,

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Speaker 2: straight from the heart. They did, not thought Michael, no

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Speaker 2: one to yourself.

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Speaker 1: And I know I went into a lot of detail,

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Speaker 1: but that is the it's the fiction writer in me.

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Speaker 1: I promise you I haven't done it. Goodness me all right,

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Speaker 1: now we better move on because I've got to get

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Speaker 1: to the international news, because there is a big story

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Speaker 1: that has been the subject of worldwide coverage over the

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Speaker 1: last twenty four hours. Iranian President Abraham Raysi, the country's

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Speaker 1: foreign minister, and other officials have died after their helicopter

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Speaker 1: crashed in the mountainous northwest reaches of Iran.

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Speaker 2: The helicopter went down in dense fog, which complicated subsequent

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Speaker 2: search efforts. Mister Araisi, a conservative who violently crushed dissent,

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Speaker 2: was widely viewed as a possible successor t Iran's Supreme leader.

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Speaker 2: Iran under mister Arasi and Supreme Leader Aetola Ali Kamani

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Speaker 2: launched a drone and miss while attack on Israel last month.

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Speaker 2: Under his rule, Uranium Enrichmond had progressed to new weapons

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Speaker 2: grade levels. The economy, though, has struggled. There's been al

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Speaker 2: sorts of unrest, particularly over women's rights and things like that.

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Speaker 2: It does leave a power vacuum now in that nation

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Speaker 2: at a time when the Middle East is certainly in

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Speaker 2: a tenuous state.

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Speaker 1: Sean new COVID nineteen variants are spreading around the world

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Speaker 1: and stoking fears of a surge in cases over the

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Speaker 1: northern summer and the latest sign of the infectious diseases

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Speaker 1: ability to mutate and potentially threaten collective immunity, so it's

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Speaker 1: called the.

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Speaker 2: Latest mutation is called KP dot two. It's one of

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Speaker 2: the so called flirt variants COUPLEF capital L, small eye

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Speaker 2: capital capital T flirt variance alert. They've become the dominant

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Speaker 2: coronavirus strain in the US since first emerging in March.

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Speaker 2: In the two weeks to May eleven, KP dot two

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Speaker 2: are canted for nearly twenty percent of cases, up from

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Speaker 2: under four percent just two weeks ago. So clearly very

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Speaker 2: very contagious. That's according to the latest data from the

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Speaker 2: US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Four and a

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Speaker 2: half years after the outbreak of the pandemic. Case laders

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Speaker 2: in the US have in recent months actually fallen close

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Speaker 2: to record lows, according to the Financial Times. But while

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Speaker 2: many infectious disease experts don't expect a big surge in

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Speaker 2: hospital admissions, this new cluster of variants could well drive

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Speaker 2: a huge surge in summer infections.

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Speaker 1: One last one, Sean Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin has resumed

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Speaker 1: sending tourists to space, launching six private passengers on a

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Speaker 1: short flight more than sixty miles above the Earth over

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Speaker 1: the weekend.

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Speaker 2: Ah, this one's for you. The passengers included Ed Dwight,

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Speaker 2: a former Air Force captain who was selected as the

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Speaker 2: first black astronaut candidate in nineteen sixty one but never

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Speaker 2: got to fly to space with NASA. The fight was

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Speaker 2: Blue Origin's first tourist mission on New Shepherd since August

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty two. The company was forced to halt flights

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Speaker 2: of that rocket type after a New Shepherd vehicle suffered

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Speaker 2: an engine failure mid flight during an uncrewed mission in

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Speaker 2: September of twenty twenty two. Blue Origins spent most of

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Speaker 2: last year investigating the failure and making design corrections. The

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Speaker 2: company had successfully returned to flight with another uncrewed mission

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Speaker 2: in December. Now you can be a space tourist again

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Speaker 2: with Blue Origin.

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Speaker 1: Are we going to talk about the shape of the

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Speaker 1: Blue Origin ships? Sean, I don't know about me.

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Speaker 2: I'm quite happy to let it go, but go for it.

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Speaker 1: You know what, they remind me of something out of

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Speaker 1: Austin Powers. Remember how there's like the suspicious kind of

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Speaker 1: space objects caught on the radar. It feels like it's

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Speaker 1: the kind of thing. But if you asked like a

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Speaker 1: fourteen year old boy to design a space a rocket,

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Speaker 1: he would design something like this. And that's what it looks.

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Speaker 2: Like, right A, right O. It's not just a fourteen

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Speaker 2: year old boy. It's like a mid thirties podcaster as well.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a very mature thirty eight year old as well. Anyway, Look,

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Speaker 1: I'll leave that one with you, and I can guarantee

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Speaker 1: you right now there will be listeners just doing a

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Speaker 1: sneaky little Google image search of the blue Origin rockets

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Speaker 1: just to see that I am correct. And if you

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Speaker 1: agree with me, please let us know. You can do

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Speaker 1: that kind of privately and anonymously. Up next, Sean is

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Speaker 1: the fit here. I'm trying to kind of regain some dignity. Now,

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Speaker 1: you have an excellent interview with Bruce Wolpy, who is

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Speaker 1: an expert on all things US from the United States

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Speaker 1: Study Center.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we talked to him about what's going to happen

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Speaker 2: this year in the election between Joe Biden and Donald Trump,

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Speaker 2: Why Americans don't like Joe Biden, why Americans are still

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Speaker 2: going to vote for Donald Trump, who he thinks will

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Speaker 2: win the election. Were worth listen.

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Speaker 1: It is a great chatters coming up next to the

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Speaker 1: Fear and Green playlist on your pod cast platform or

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Speaker 1: at Fearangreed dot com dot au, which is also where

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Speaker 1: you can sign up for the Fear and Greed newsletter

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Speaker 1: which comes out tomorrow. Thank you Sean, Thank you Michael.

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Speaker 1: It's Tuesday, the twenty first of May twenty twenty four.

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Speaker 1: Make sure you're following the podcast and please join us

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Speaker 1: online on LinkedIn, Instagram, x TikTok and Facebook. I'm Michael

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Speaker 1: Thompson and that was Fear and Greed. Have a great day.