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

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Speaker 1: for Wednesday, the twenty fifth of February twenty twenty six.

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

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

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Speaker 1: Let's go with story number one. A heck of a

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Speaker 1: day for the local share market. The S and PA

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Speaker 1: SEX two hundred jumped one point two percent today to

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Speaker 1: a record close of nine thousand, one hundred and twenty

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Speaker 1: eight points after hitting an intra day high above one

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Speaker 1: hundred and thirty points. The gain surpassed the previous record

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Speaker 1: close set back in October. Investors seemingly brushing off a

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Speaker 1: surprisingly high monthly inflation number today, a number that probably

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Speaker 1: increases the likelihood of another interest rate hike. And there

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Speaker 1: are three sectors in particular that I want to mention

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Speaker 1: this afternoon, textdocs, consumer staples, and the miners. Let's start

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Speaker 1: with technology. The sector rebounded today after a strong rally

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Speaker 1: on Wall Street overnight that was largely due to aid

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Speaker 1: giant Anthropic reassuring investors that its product supports, rather than replaces,

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Speaker 1: other software companies. Zero climbed five and a half percent today,

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Speaker 1: next DC added about the same and Wistech surged eleven

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Speaker 1: point one percent. It also reported results today and announced

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Speaker 1: some big job cuts onto consumer staples. The standout was

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Speaker 1: Woolworth's soring thirteen percent. That is its biggest one day

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Speaker 1: gain in three decades after delivering earnings about six percent

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Speaker 1: ahead of expectations. That is a seventeen month high for

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Speaker 1: Woollies and a very big turnaround from where it was

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Speaker 1: about six months ago when investors hammered it after its

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Speaker 1: results back in August, and I mentioned the miners. A

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Speaker 1: great day for the big miners. Fourdescue was up four

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Speaker 1: point seven percent after reporting a twenty three percent rise

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Speaker 1: in half year net profit to one point nine billion

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Speaker 1: US dollars, and the big Australian BHP you climbed more

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Speaker 1: than three percent to another record high. You put it

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Speaker 1: all together and it helped push the ASX to one

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Speaker 1: hundred to its own record. Close onto story number two

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Speaker 1: now and I mentioned the company's reporting results. There was

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Speaker 1: a few of them already, Woolly's, Ford, Escu, Wisetech, a

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Speaker 1: few others worth a mention. Tab Corp surged twenty three

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Speaker 1: and a half percent today after first half earnings came

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Speaker 1: in well ahead of expectations. Shoe retailer Accent Group jumped

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Speaker 1: almost twenty percent on a stronger than expected half drone

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Speaker 1: shield That is a volatile stock. It jumped twelve point

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Speaker 1: six percent today after reporting a wait for it, three

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Speaker 1: hundred and sixty seven percent surge in profit and a

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Speaker 1: two hundred and seventy six percent spike in revenue, driven

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Speaker 1: of course, by booming global demand for counter drone technology.

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Speaker 1: And finally, Dominoes tumbled eleven percent after slashing its interim

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Speaker 1: dividend and flagging softer same store sales. The company is

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Speaker 1: moving away from heavy discounting of pizzas and it is

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Speaker 1: taking a little bit of adjustment. Story number three. A

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Speaker 1: bomb threat forced the cuation of Prime Minister Anthony Albanezi

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Speaker 1: from the lodge after an email claimed explosives had been

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Speaker 1: planted at the Prime Minister's official Canberra residents. This all

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Speaker 1: happened last night. The message, written in Chinese, demanded the

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Speaker 1: cancelation of upcoming performances by Shenyun Performing Arts, which is

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Speaker 1: a group previously associated with the spiritual movement Fell and Gong,

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Speaker 1: which is banned from performing in mainland China. The letter

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Speaker 1: claimed that and I quote large quantities of nitro glycerine

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Speaker 1: explosives had been placed around the lodge and that if

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Speaker 1: the shenyun shows went ahead, blood will flow like a river.

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Speaker 1: The Australian Federal Police searched the lodge for about three

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Speaker 1: hours last night before declaring it's safe. No explosives were found.

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Speaker 1: The threat was deemed a hoax, but all the details

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Speaker 1: now are coming out. Story number four. Deloitte Australia has

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Speaker 1: worn staff to stop uploading confidential client data to Chat,

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Speaker 1: GPT and other public AI platforms, citing a spike in

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Speaker 1: internal data incidents. In an email to its audit division

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Speaker 1: reported in the Financial Review today, the firm said there

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Speaker 1: had been a quote sudden increase in breaches, including staff

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Speaker 1: sending files to personal email accounts or using unapproved technology.

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Speaker 1: Partners and employees are instead directed to use Deloitte's approved

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Speaker 1: internal AI tools instead of publicly available systems where uploaded

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Speaker 1: information may be stored externally and actually used to train

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Speaker 1: the models. It's probably a timely warning for anyone who's

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Speaker 1: perhaps getting a little overly friendly with Chat, GPT sharing

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Speaker 1: personal health and financial information with it. That is private

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Speaker 1: data that won't necessarily stay private. And finally, story number five,

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Speaker 1: The director of the Louver Lauren de car has resigned

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Speaker 1: after months of pressure following an eighty eight million euro

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Speaker 1: duel heist to the Paris Museum last October. We talked

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Speaker 1: about this a lot at the time. Thieves broke into

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Speaker 1: the building and stole eight historic pieces, including jewels linked

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Speaker 1: to two empresses. Five suspects have been charged over the robbery,

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Speaker 1: but the items they allegedly stole have not been recovered.

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Speaker 1: Desca initially offered to step down after the theft, but

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Speaker 1: was asked to stay in the role to steady the

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Speaker 1: ship during a public inquiry. That inquiry this week criticized

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Speaker 1: systematic failures in security. French President Emmanuel mccron has now

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Speaker 1: accepted her resignation, saying the museum requires renewed leadership. And

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Speaker 1: that is it for the Afternoon Report for Wednesday, Hit

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

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Speaker 1: podcast and head along the Fear and Greed dot com

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Speaker 1: dot au to sign up for our free daily newsletter.

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Speaker 1: A'm Michael Thompson. Enjoy your evening,