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

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Speaker 1: for Thursday, the sixth of February twenty twenty five. I'm

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Speaker 1: Sean Almer. Every afternoon, we've got the five stories that

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Speaker 1: happened today that you need to know about. Story number one,

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Speaker 1: the fact that Donald Trump hasn't spoken about tariffs and

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Speaker 1: is talking about taking an interest in the Middle East

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Speaker 1: in Gaza was enough to push the local share market higher.

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Speaker 1: Weird as that sounds, just the fact that he was

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Speaker 1: focused on non tariff issues helped the bors. In fact,

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Speaker 1: it finished up more than one percent to eighty five

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Speaker 1: hundred and twenty points. That's only about twelve points off

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Speaker 1: its all time high. Interest rate sensitive stocks did very well.

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Speaker 1: The consumer discretionary sector did well. West Farmers, for example,

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Speaker 1: was up three percent. It was the best of the

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Speaker 1: large caps. The banks were also higher, Comwealth Bank, National,

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Speaker 1: Australia Bank, Westpac A and ZED. They were all up

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Speaker 1: between two percent and two and a half percent. Gave

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Speaker 1: a shout out to Telstra earlier in the week for

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Speaker 1: being positive well. Of the very large camps, it was

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Speaker 1: the only one negative today. There you go straight up two.

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Speaker 1: Real Tinto is looking at green energy from its massive

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Speaker 1: aluminum smelter in Queensland, increasingly confident that batteries can provide

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Speaker 1: a solution to intermittency issues around renewables. It might seem

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Speaker 1: like an inconsequential story to many, but it's not. Aluminium

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Speaker 1: smelters use as massive amounts of energy. In fact, they're

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Speaker 1: one of the most energy intensive industrial processes around the place.

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Speaker 1: Smelters run twenty four hours a day. Now renewable struggle

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Speaker 1: to provide consistent energy for smelters. RIO is now saying

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Speaker 1: that the fast falling costs of batteries and improved ability

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Speaker 1: to store energy means that maybe smelters will be able

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Speaker 1: to use green energy. That talking about firming power, it's

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Speaker 1: when solar and wind is at low ebbs be able

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Speaker 1: to get those batteries to kick in. If it can

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Speaker 1: do it at smelters, it probably can do it at

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Speaker 1: a bunch of other places. Now, this is the first

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Speaker 1: time RIO has spoken about renewables being the one hundred

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Speaker 1: percent power source for the aluminium smelters, so it is significant.

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Speaker 1: Straight up. As three online property group Aria has kicked

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Speaker 1: off earnings season, announcing a twenty six percent jump in profit,

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Speaker 1: triggering a three percent rise in its share price. Aria

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Speaker 1: is controlled by News Corporation. It's the largest property listing

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Speaker 1: platform in the country. It was share prices up thirteen

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Speaker 1: percent in just three weeks, thirty five percent in the

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Speaker 1: past five months, after it walked away from a bid

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Speaker 1: for a UK property group. Now the strong six months

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Speaker 1: to the end of December was on the back of

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Speaker 1: plenty of listings and the ability to charge good money.

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Speaker 1: Sales volumes across the sector are higher, and part of

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Speaker 1: that is because buyers benefiting from a moderation in price growth.

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Speaker 1: So companies like ARIA in domain only care that there

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Speaker 1: are ads. They don't care whether the market's going up

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Speaker 1: or down. Its long term boss Owen Wilson, that's Aria's

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Speaker 1: long term boss. Owen Wilson been there for six years.

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Speaker 1: He today said that he'll step down now. The jump

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Speaker 1: in Aria's revenue and profit helped News corps overall result

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Speaker 1: as well. The media conglomerate reported an increase in revenue

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Speaker 1: and earnings. Share price jumped five percent, best of the

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Speaker 1: top two hundred today. Now. ARIA is part of News Corp,

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Speaker 1: but lots of other things. Dow Jones, Wall Street Journal,

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Speaker 1: Times of London, The Australian. It also owns harpercons and Foxtel,

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Speaker 1: which it's selling in a three point four billion dollar deal.

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Speaker 1: Join Umber four last month was the hottest January on record,

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Speaker 1: surprising scientists who expected the cooling La Nina weather cycle

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Speaker 1: and the tropical Pacific to slow almost two years of

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Speaker 1: record high temperatures. January ranked as the third hottest month

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Speaker 1: globally on record, with the surface air temperature of thirteen

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Speaker 1: point two to three degrees celsius, which is one point

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Speaker 1: seven five degrees celsius above the pre industrial average, according

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Speaker 1: to the Copernicus Climate Change Service the EUS Earth Observation Agency.

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Speaker 1: The warming is set to fuel concerns that climate change

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Speaker 1: is accelerating at a time when countries like the US

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Speaker 1: are pulling back on commitment to reduce emissions. Bill maguire, Emeritus,

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Speaker 1: Professor of Geophysical and Climate Hazards at ucl SO the

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Speaker 1: January data was both astonishing and frankly terrifying. He went

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Speaker 1: on to say, on the basis of the Valentia floods

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Speaker 1: in the apocalyptic Los Angeles wildfires, I don't think there

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Speaker 1: can be any doubt that dangerous or pervasive climate breakdown

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Speaker 1: has arrived. And story at number five global consulting firm,

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Speaker 1: McKenzie is considering withdrawing from China, worried that doing business

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Speaker 1: there isn't worth the risk given the tense relationship between

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Speaker 1: Washington and Beijing. Some senior partners have been voicing concerns

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Speaker 1: since late last year, even before Donald Trump was re elected.

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Speaker 1: According to Bloomberg, the lucrative North American business can more

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Speaker 1: than offset a China retreat, or at least some partners

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Speaker 1: believe that. Currently McKinsey has offices in one hundred and

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Speaker 1: thirty cities and sixty five countries. It has a stated

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Speaker 1: goal to expand, not to shrink. A record number of

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Speaker 1: US companies in China, About thirty percent are actually thinking

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Speaker 1: of moving some operations out of the country or are

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Speaker 1: already doing so, according to a recent survey published by

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Speaker 1: the American Chamber of Commerce in China. That's it for

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Speaker 1: the Afternoon Report for Thursday, the sixth to February twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty five. Make sure you hit follow on the podcast.

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Speaker 1: We will be back tomorrow morning with the Friday edition

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Speaker 1: of The Fast five Business Years by Fear and Greed.

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Speaker 1: I'm Shane Elma. Enjoy your reading