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Speaker 1: It's Tuesday, the fourth of March twenty twenty five. Welcome

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

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

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Speaker 1: need to know in just five minutes. I'm Michael Thompson

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Speaker 1: and good morning.

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Speaker 2: Sean Aylmer, Good morning, Michael Shawn.

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Speaker 1: Five stories in five minutes. Let's go a story number one.

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Speaker 1: Shareholders are set to receive nearly twenty seven billion dollars

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Speaker 1: in dividends during the next seven weeks as the December

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Speaker 1: half profit season wraps up, with the consensus view really

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Speaker 1: among investors being that it was a pretty ordinary profit season.

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Speaker 2: I think so mixed is another way of putting it.

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Speaker 2: Several analysts have noted how big the share price moves

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Speaker 2: were after companies disappointed. A way of measuring the overall

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Speaker 2: profit season is look at what happened to consensus earnings

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Speaker 2: for the rest of the year. Of course, the market

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Speaker 2: trades on future not passed. The consensus earnings for the

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Speaker 2: rest of the year were downgraded by about one percent.

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Speaker 2: That's three years in a row where earnings are likely

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Speaker 2: to be lower. Almost forty percent of companies beat consensus earnings.

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Speaker 2: Almost forty percent missed concents, earnings, more than half up

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Speaker 2: to earnings and fifty six percent lifted dividends. The actual

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Speaker 2: market itself was down about four percent during February. That

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Speaker 2: suggests it wasn't a good earning season. About six hundred

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Speaker 2: and twenty million dollars will be paid to investors this week,

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Speaker 2: the big week of dividends, the one where Comonwealth Bank,

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Speaker 2: the HP, Telstra, they all pay. That's the final week

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Speaker 2: of March, twelve point six billion dollars in dividends.

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Speaker 1: So they're the numbers. What sectors do the best? Which

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Speaker 1: ones said the worst?

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Speaker 2: So the banks disappointing from National Australia Bank, Bendigo and

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Speaker 2: Adelaide Westpac though they were quarterly results. Commwealth Bank did well,

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Speaker 2: but the banking sector generally wasn't so good. The big

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Speaker 2: miners what we saw as iron or really the lower

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Speaker 2: prices and lack of demand from China hitting that sector.

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Speaker 2: Retailers Jbhi Fi, Harvey Norman kind of good on the

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Speaker 2: back of AI enable devices, Woollis v Coals Cole's winning

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Speaker 2: that battle at the moment. Telstra did pretty well. Contest

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Speaker 2: did pretty well also, and property groups Goodman led the way,

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Speaker 2: the industrial property Giant, which is now data center property giant.

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Speaker 2: Really what we found out from the rest center vicinity,

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Speaker 2: Texas residential struggling, but some of the other areas, retail, industrial,

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Speaker 2: even office is doing okay, all right.

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Speaker 1: Moving on to story number two now and a bit

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Speaker 1: of good news for crypto lovers. US President Donald Trump

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Speaker 1: said a US Strategic Reserve of digital assets. That they

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Speaker 1: include bitcoin as well as some lesser known tokens.

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Speaker 2: Think of a Fort Knox for gold equivalent for cryptos.

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Speaker 2: I don't know how you do that anyway. Trump signed

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Speaker 2: an executive order to supporting digital assets and blockchain technology

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Speaker 2: when he first came to office, he said it create

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Speaker 2: a stockpile of digital assets. Yesterday, he said Bitcoin and

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Speaker 2: ethereum will be the heart of the reserve, adding that

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Speaker 2: it will also include Solana, XRP and Cardano and of course,

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Speaker 2: he announced it on to social I will make sure

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Speaker 2: the US is a crypto capital of the world, he wrote.

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Speaker 2: We are in all caps, making America great again. Bitcoin

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Speaker 2: jumped to ninety three thousand US dollars a unit.

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Speaker 1: Story number three, The Wyala Steel Works lost three hundred

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Speaker 1: and nineteen million dollars in just seven months before the

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Speaker 1: South Australian government sees the plant and in the by

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Speaker 1: mine and called in administrators Quartermantha.

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Speaker 2: There are structuring experts now running the mill, said the

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Speaker 2: steel works nearby iron Ore mine in the Middleback Rangers

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Speaker 2: are still losing one and a half million dollars a

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Speaker 2: day credited as they rowed one point thirty five billion dollars.

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Speaker 2: The steel works is owned by British industrial soun Jeev Gupta,

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Speaker 2: but South Australian Premier Peter de Melanowskas expects Quartermantha to

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Speaker 2: run the mill until the middle of next year as

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Speaker 2: they unmined the complex links with Gupta's business. Now his

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Speaker 2: business called GfG Alliance, acquired the steel works back in

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Speaker 2: twenty seventeen. Mister Goopta yesterday told a meeting of creditors

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Speaker 2: in Wyala that he was owed five hundred and thirty

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Speaker 2: six million dollars. GfG blamed negative press for making it

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Speaker 2: difficult to refinance the steel mill, adding it had been

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Speaker 2: running at about twenty five percent of its usual capacity

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Speaker 2: because of extended problems with the blast furnace.

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Speaker 1: Story Number four Star Entertainment Sean remains on the brink

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Speaker 1: of collapse and IT shares are suspended from trading, with

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Speaker 1: no last minute rescue package arriving yet.

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Speaker 2: Yes In a statement, they said there remains material uncertainty

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Speaker 2: as to the group's ability to continue as a going concern.

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Speaker 2: The company is unlikely to be in a position to

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Speaker 2: lodge its accounts unless and until it has secured a

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Speaker 2: refinancing commitment to refinance all of the group's existing corporate debt,

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Speaker 2: as well as to provide additional liquidity. Not looking good

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Speaker 2: for the Star Casino It's got casinos in Brisbane, Gold

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Speaker 2: Coast to Sydney. Last week it had one week of

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Speaker 2: cash left now. New South Wales Premier Chris Mens yesterday

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Speaker 2: reiter rated that there would be no more financial assistance

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Speaker 2: to the Star from that state.

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Speaker 1: Last one story number five. Prata is the front runner

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Speaker 1: to buy Versaci from Capri Holdings for about one and

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Speaker 1: a half billion euro in a move that would combine

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Speaker 1: two of Italy's best known luxury fashion brand.

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Speaker 2: Milan based Prata and Capri, which owns brands including cors

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Speaker 2: and Jimmy Cho are edging closer to an agreement and

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Speaker 2: a deal could be concluded within weeks. According to the

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Speaker 2: ft Capri's initial asking price was three billion euros. Capri

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Speaker 2: purchased the Italian luxury brand founded by the late Gianni

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Speaker 2: Versaci for about one point eight five billion euros including debt,

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Speaker 2: in twenty eighteen. It's been looking to sell for some time.

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Speaker 2: They've accelerated the plan to sell after pre called off

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Speaker 2: a merged with rival Tapestry Coaches. It's big brand, Prata,

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Speaker 2: is Italy's largest luxury fashion group and its financial performance

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Speaker 2: has remained pretty strong despite a sector slowdown, partly due

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Speaker 2: to its booming Moui brand.

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Speaker 1: I love that you said that with a straight face,

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Speaker 1: like you know what you're talk here about. Well done,

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Speaker 1: you got through it.

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Speaker 2: Good work.

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Speaker 1: There we go, the top five business stories in five minutes.

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Speaker 1: Thank you Sean, Thank you Michael. It is Tuesday, the

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Speaker 1: fourth of March twenty twenty five, remembered hit follow on

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Speaker 1: the podcast and if five minutes isn't enough, you're can

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Speaker 1: find our longer daily show called Fear and Greed whereever

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Speaker 1: you listen to podcasts. I'm Michael Thompson and that was

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Speaker 1: the fast five business news by Fear and Greed. Have

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Speaker 1: a great day,