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- 📈 Australia hit by more US tariffs | Hollywood mega-merger on hold
📈 Australia hit by more US tariffs | Hollywood mega-merger on hold
Here's what you need to know today
The Big Picture
Australia hit with more US tariffs. Australia, along with 59 other countries, were hit with fresh tariffs on Friday. Australia had an additional 12.5% tariff placed on goods entering the US. The reason given by the US is Australia had failed to enforce bans on goods made with forced labour however, this is contradicted by the U.S. State Department’s own Trafficking in Persons Report that gave Australia the highest possible rating for stopping modern slavery. This fresh wave of tariffs come after the US Supreme Court struck down Trump’s global 10% tariff. (ABC)
Big earnings week upcoming: Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Apple. Investors are going to get a good look at the state of the US economy and the state of the AI story this week, with 4 of America’s biggest companies reporting earnings. So far, with 27% of S&P 500 companies reporting results, the combined profit growth of the S&P 500 is 37.9% year-on-year. (FactSet)
Oil prices sit just below $100 a barrel. Since US President Trump declared the ceasefire over on 8 July, Brent crude oil prices have risen almost 40% from just above $70 to just below $100. Over the weekend, the US appeared to pause strikes on Iran. However, the second front may be escalating with Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen trading strikes with US-backed Saudi Arabia. (FT)
China doubles down on green energy investments. As the world manages the energy price shock from the Strait of Hormuz closure, China has invested a record $20.1 billion in the first half of 2026 in green energy projects as part of its Belt and Road initiative. Also of note, Chinese Belt and Road investments in Africa tripled in the first half of 2026 to $33.5 billion. (FT)
Investors are cooling on chipmakers. The US semiconductor index dropped 4% on Friday and is on track for its worst month since 2022. A sign that investors are cooling on semiconductors is Intel. After reporting its fastest revenue growth in 15 years and profit above Wall St estimates, Intel’s share price still dropped 8%. (Barron’s)
Europe’s heatwave becomes a national emergency. An estimated 260,000 people have been forced to evacuate fires in Spain and France, with the two countries requesting assistance from the European Union. For the first time, Spain declared a national emergency over its out-of-control wildfires, while in France, interior minister Laurent Nuñez reported 98,000 hectares had been burnt so far, a French record. (FT)
India’s ‘cockroach’ movement halts protests. The Gen Z protest movement rocking India has said it would end weeks of protests after Narendra Modi’s government agreed to all its main demands. Education minister Dharmendra Pradhan resigned on Saturday and the government accepted a charter for exam reform. The government also agreed to drop prosecutions against protestors. (FT | Reuters)
Companies in the news
Hollywood mega-merger on hold. Paramount Skydance announced it would pause its US$110 billion merger with Warner Bros Discovery until 1 June 2027 or until a legal challenge from a coalition of twelve state Attorney-Generals is resolved. The lawsuit claims the merger would breach antitrust law and reduce competition in film and TV production and distribution. (NBC)
Volkswagen’s terrible year continues. The German carmaker announced profits dropped 33% in the second quarter and group-wide vehicle deliveries fell almost 9%. The biggest cause of these falls is growing competition from Chinese carmakers. Volkswagen shares are already down 33% year-to-date and it announced earlier this month it would cut up to 100,000 jobs by 2030. (Yahoo | BBC)
US tech companies have cut 140,000 jobs in 2026. AI giants Amazon, Oracle, Meta and Microsoft account for almost 50,000 of these cuts, and they come as these hyperscalers - alongside Alphabet - together invest nearly $800 billion in data centres this year. Meanwhile, other tech companies have announced layoffs to realise efficiencies from AI, such as Block which announced it would lay off nearly half of its 10,000-person workforce. (FT)
Investment gains add to US record profits
In the first quarter of 2026, Alphabet, Amazon, and Nvidia recorded over $69 billion of profit without receiving a single dollar. That’s because their investments in Anthropic, SpaceX, OpenAI and other AI-related companies skyrocketed in value. The way US accounting rules work, these gains on investments are included as 'Other Income & Expenses' and added to the bottom line.
In the first quarter, the entire S&P 500 earned an estimated $575 billion in profit, meaning these investment gains accounted for 12% of the index’s quarterly earnings. And this number is going to be even bigger in the second quarter, as last week, Alphabet alone reported $98 billion in investment gains for Q2. (Baolian Wang)
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Super life insurance: Yay or nay?
We asked financial adviser Ellie Fordham from Verse Wealth about the differences between buying life insurance inside or outside your superannuation.
What's the difference when you're buying life insurance as part of your super fund in super and then buying life insurance outside of super?
Ellie: Main difference really is the terms and conditions of the policies that you put in place. So when you buy insurance through your super fund, generally you don't go through a process of confirming your medical conditions and your personal history.
The super fund really isn't understanding your risk associated with having that policy. So the best way I describe it to clients is if you bought a house and the wall on one side of the house is missing, probably not going to get insurance for the house because it's damaged.
It's the same if you get life insurance. If you've had a medical event or if you've had a heart attack, probably going to be with insurers that want to give you cover, whereas when you have it through super, they don't go through that process. They just give it sort of to everyone. But it just means the conditions around when they pay out a claim are slightly different and it's the discretion of the super fund to change those conditions over time.
Want to work with an adviser like Ellie to sort out your life insurance inside or outside your superannuation? Fill out the form on our website and we’ll match you with one of our hand-picked advisers to help you get started.
