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

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Speaker 1: for Monday, the ninth of February twenty twenty six. I'm

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

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Speaker 1: that happened today that you need to know about. Let's

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Speaker 1: go with story number one. The S and p ASX

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Speaker 1: two hundred had an incredible day. It surged one point

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Speaker 1: nine percent to eight hundred and seventy points. That is

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Speaker 1: its biggest one day rise since April of last year,

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Speaker 1: but it did follow a two percent drop on Friday

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Speaker 1: that wiped about sixty five billion dollars in value from

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Speaker 1: the market. Every sector today was in the green, but

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Speaker 1: it was a particularly good session for the tech sector

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Speaker 1: after a very ordinary week last week. Wise Tech Global

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Speaker 1: and Technology One both climbed around three and a half percent.

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Speaker 1: In a related space, data center operators like next DC,

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Speaker 1: Megaport and Goodman surged off the back of comments from

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Speaker 1: Commonwealth Bank that Australia is one of the world's top

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Speaker 1: destinations for AI investment, and the price of gold bounced

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Speaker 1: back above fo thousand US dollars, an ounce which played

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Speaker 1: well for the local gold miners. Newmont was up six

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Speaker 1: point five percent today. A jumping commodity price has also

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Speaker 1: helped mining giant BHP, which is up nearly two percent

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Speaker 1: on to story number two now and there are a

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Speaker 1: number of smaller companies reporting December half earnings today. Online

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Speaker 1: Jobs Board seeks share price fell after it recognized a

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Speaker 1: three hundred and sixty five million dollar impairment tied to

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Speaker 1: its investment in a Chinese based platform. Dexas Convenience Retail

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Speaker 1: rate jumped after reporting a near doubling of net profit.

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Speaker 1: Dexas has about ninety one retail assets. Car Group surged

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Speaker 1: almost ten percent after it met market expectations with a

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Speaker 1: profit of one hundred and forty three million dollars, which

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Speaker 1: was up sixteen percent. Argo Investments rose after a slight

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Speaker 1: rise in its net profit, and Web Travel jumped nearly

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Speaker 1: nineteen percent. I saved the best for last after tumbling

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Speaker 1: thirty percent last Friday after reaffirming its profit guidance. Friday's

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Speaker 1: full came after an announcement that the group's Spanish bish

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Speaker 1: business was being audited. On to story number three, the

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Speaker 1: coalition's primary vote has plunged to just eighteen percent, while

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Speaker 1: One Nation support has surged to twenty seven percent. According

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Speaker 1: to a new news poll published today in The Australian,

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Speaker 1: support for One Nation is now closer to Labour's primary

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Speaker 1: vote than to the coalition. The poll shows Labour's primary

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Speaker 1: vote lifting to thirty three percent, putting it on track

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Speaker 1: for a larger election win than last year if the

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Speaker 1: result was to be repeated nationally, though we don't actually

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Speaker 1: know the usual two party preferred split because the Coalition's

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Speaker 1: primary vote is so low and One Nation's support is

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Speaker 1: usually focused on just a few key seats. The results

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Speaker 1: come after the Liberals and Nationals, of course, formally reunited

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Speaker 1: over the weekend following a seventeen day split, with National's

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Speaker 1: lead at David little Prowd declaring the episode showed maturity

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Speaker 1: and leadership. Story number four. Labour's plan to finish the

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Speaker 1: national broadband network by rolling out faster fiber connections to

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Speaker 1: most homes and businesses won't be completed until twenty forty,

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Speaker 1: according to government documents reported in The Australian. The upgrade,

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Speaker 1: announced before the twenty twenty five election, aims to connect

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Speaker 1: an additional six hundred and twenty two thousand premises at

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Speaker 1: a total cost of about five billion dollars. The first

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Speaker 1: stage of the rollout isn't expected to be completed until

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Speaker 1: mid twenty thirty two are the second stage, extending the

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Speaker 1: project's timeline by another eight years. If completed as forecast,

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Speaker 1: the NBN will have taken more than thirty years from

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Speaker 1: announcement to finish, making it the longest running individual infrastructure

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Speaker 1: project in Australia's history. And finally, story number five, the

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Speaker 1: Jeffrey Epstein saga has claimed a major scalp, with the

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Speaker 1: chief of Staff to UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer resigning.

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Speaker 1: There is a fair bit to this. Chief of Staff

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Speaker 1: Morgan McSweeney, stepped down after criticism over his role in

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Speaker 1: pushing for Peter Mandelson to be appointed Britain's ambassador to

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Speaker 1: the US last year. Now, Mandalson, who was a member

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Speaker 1: of the House of Lords, allegedly had ties to convicted

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Speaker 1: sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and officials reportedly warned McSweeney on

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Speaker 1: two occasions, and yet he still insisted Mandleson was the

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Speaker 1: best person for the job. Mandlsson was sacked later last

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Speaker 1: year after the Epstein links became public. In a statement,

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Speaker 1: McSweeney said the decision to appoint Mandleson was wrong and

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Speaker 1: he accepted full responsibility for advising the Prime Minister. His

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Speaker 1: resignation is seen as an attempt to stabilize Sir Keir

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Speaker 1: Starmer's leadership after growing unrest within the Labor Party. MP

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Speaker 1: is basically threatening a leadership challenge unless accountability was taken.

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Speaker 1: Whether this will be enough to let the UK Prime

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Speaker 1: Minister keep his job, well, that remains to be seen.

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Speaker 1: That's it for the Afternoon Report for Monday, the ninth

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Speaker 1: of February twenty twenty six. Make sure you're following the

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Speaker 1: podcast and headlong to Fear and Greed dot com dot

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Speaker 1: au to sign up for our free daily newsletter. I'm

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Speaker 1: Michael Thompson. Enjoy your evening.