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Here’s what you need to know today

• Australian investors shrugged off America’s latest tariff threat, with President Trump increasing his threatened pharmaceutical tariff to 250% over the next 18 months. Australia exports US$2.2bn worth of pharmaceuticals to the US, with 87% of it coming from one company: CSL. Despite the threat, CSL’s shares were up 1% yesterday. (Capital Brief)
  
  

• Meanwhile, America’s latest trade figures show tariffs are starting to impact the amount of overseas goods Americans are buying. In June, the country’s trade deficit fell 16% year-on-year to $60.2bn. This is its lowest level in two years. (Quartz)
  
  

• The ASX 200 reached a new record high on Wednesday. It is now up over 7% for the year, and has recovered 20% since Liberation Day. This is a great reminder to stay invested despite all the noise.
  
  

• Outgoing REA Group CEO Owen Wilson gave shareholders a lovely parting gift: a 35% increase in the dividend. The property platform reported revenue up 15% and profit up 23%, which didn’t just cheer up REA investors but also gave parent company News Corp a boost, helping it beat expectations and sending its shares up 6%. (Capital Brief)
  
  

• OpenAI has released its first open-source AI models in six years, marking a major shift for the company known for its closed, proprietary approach. These new models are free to use, highly customisable, and can even be run offline, without internet access or costly compute tokens. It's a move that could reshape the economics of AI. (Twitter/X)
  
  

• OpenAI also announced it was on track for 700 million weekly ChatGPT users - almost 9% of the world’s population. Meanwhile, a potential employee share sale could value the company at a staggering $500 billion. (Reuters)

  
  

• Palantir shares jumped 8% after the software analytics firm beat expectations and reported a 48% jump in revenue to achieve it’s first-ever billion dollar quarter. The stock has now soared over 120% this year, with AI momentum and government contracts pushing its market cap past $400 billion and making it one of America’s 20 most valuable companies. (CNBC)
  
  

• Tesla’s UK sales crashed nearly 60% in July, with just 987 vehicles registered - its worst monthly result in years. Meanwhile, Chinese rival BYD outsold Tesla more than 3 to 1. Analysts point to rising competition, pricing pressure, and a growing consumer backlash as key reasons behind the slide. (Financial Times) For more on the rise of Chinese EVs listen to the recent deep dive on Equity Mates Investing. (Apple | Spotify)

  
  

• The Norwegian government has ordered a review of its US$2 trillion sovereign wealth fund’s investments in Israeli companies, following complaints about links to the war in Gaza. The fund, which owns stakes in 8,700 companies worldwide, held shares in 65 Israeli companies at the end of 2024, valued at $1.95 billion. (Reuters)
  
  

• Australia’s online safety regulator has accused tech giants including Apple, Google, and Meta of not doing enough to tackle child sexual exploitation and abuse across their platforms. The eSafety Commissioner’s latest transparency report found little progress since 2022, with major safety gaps still left unaddressed. (Reuters)
  
  

• One of the world’s largest batteries has been switched on in NSW. The Waratah Super Battery, on the site of the former Munmorah coal-fired power station on the Central Coast is capable of powering more than one million homes in NSW. (ABC News)
  
  

• Australia’s NBN Co has signed a satellite internet deal to connect rural and remote Australians with fast internet. Surprisingly the state-owned corporation choose Amazon’s Project Kupier over SpaceX’s Starlink to replace the existing Sky Muster service to bring satellite internet to more than 300,000 Australians. (Tech Business News)

What the…?

A new US survey found that 1 in 4 Gen Z workers regret going to college. With tuition costs rising, debt ballooning, and alternatives like online courses and trade schools gaining traction, younger workers are rethinking the return on a traditional degree.

Given the chance to do it over, many say they’d take a different path, whether that’s choosing a higher-earning field like tech or finance, picking a cheaper school, learning a trade, or skipping uni altogether to start a business.

In a world where AI and skills-based hiring are on the rise, this shift might just be getting started. (Quartz)

Investing is a lifelong journey

Here’s what you can learn today.

Are small cap fund manager’s worth it?

This is taken from the Equity Mates Investing episode titled ‘Expert: Andrew Page – How We Can All Invest In Aussie Small Caps (And Bitcoin)’ (Apple | Spotify | YouTube)

How do you think about choosing between a small cap active manager and being an individual small cap investor yourself?

This is tough. And look, it sounds a bit mean, like I’m just throwing shade at the industry, but when you look at the track records of many fund managers, they’re not great. Often they underperform the benchmark. And when they do perform well, they rarely back it up.

It’s not because they’re idiots. It’s the incentive structure. They’re trying to knock the lights out in a given year so they can write a great annual report and attract more funds. But that short-term thinking means they’re not always around long enough to benefit from the compounding we all talk about.

There are some incredible small cap managers out there. Horses for courses. If you're going that route, do your research. Personally, I want to see at least 3–5 years of solid outperformance, and I want to see a meaningful chunk of their own wealth in the fund. If a fund manager doesn’t have skin in the game, that’s a red flag and unfortunately, it’s more common than you'd think.

You’ve got to do almost as much research on the fund as you would on a company if you were buying the stock directly. Don’t just say, “I want to go small cap,” hear a podcast mention it, and jump on the first fund that pops up. That’s the mistake. Do your research.

Want to check out the full episode? All Equity Mates Investing episodes are now released on their own YouTube channel:

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