Today’s News

The Big Picture

• Australians shifting to riskier super funds. More Aussies are moving into higher-risk super options, with switches up 17% over the past year, according to the Super Members Council. Most of the movement is coming from those with smaller balances. Experts have warned caution, pointing to recent fund collapses like Shield and First Guardian. (ABC)
  
  

• 1,800 firms sue US government over tariff refunds. Following FedEx’s lead, more than 1,800 companies have filed lawsuits seeking refunds after the Supreme Court ruled against President Trump’s global tariffs. The levies raised about US$130bn in 10 months — but clawing that back could take far longer. (WSJ)
  
  

• IMF urges US to rethink economic management. The IMF has criticised the US government’s handling of tariffs and cuts to key public services. Around 15% of staff across tax and statistical agencies have been let go in the past year, with the Fund warning that both are already “underfunded.” (FT)
  
  

• Germany looks to narrow trade gap with China. Chancellor Friedrich Merz has labelled Germany’s trade deficit with China “not healthy,” with imports more than double exports. While China remains Germany’s largest trading partner, economists warn the imbalance is eroding many domestic German industries.(BBC)

Companies in the news

• CBA cuts 300 tech roles weeks after AI reassurance. Just two weeks after CEO Matt Comyn said AI wouldn’t have as large an impact as predicted, CBA has quietly axed 300 technology roles. The cuts were made without a formal public announcement. (Capital Brief)
  
  

• Nvidia juggernaut rolls on — but shares stall. The world’s most valuable company beat expectations, reporting US$78bn in revenue versus US$72.1bn forecast. Despite another record quarter, shares were flat after hours as investors remain wary of AI exuberance. (FT)
  
  

• Qantas falls despite profit beat. Australia’s largest airline exceeded profit expectations, but shares still dropped 9% as investors questioned demand, particularly in the corporate travel segment. (AFR)
  
  

• Is the SaaS-pocalypse upon us? Salesforce posted softer forward guidance, fuelling concerns AI could disrupt traditional software models. CEO Marc Benioff joked any “SaaS-pocalypse” would be eaten by the “SaaS-quatch,” as he noted AI company Anthropic runs its whole operations on Salesforce and Slack. However Salesforce shares have been hit hard over the past year with shares down 37%. (FT)
  
  

• Diageo tumbles 14% on weak US sales. The drinks giant cut its sales outlook and dividend as US demand softens. CEO Dave Lewis, nicknamed “Drastic Dave” for past cost-cutting moves at Tesco and Unilever, now faces his biggest test yet, slowing global alcohol consumption. (Reuters)
  
  

• Aston Martin slashes 20% of workforce. The luxury carmaker is cutting staff after net losses jumped 52% to £493m. US tariffs continue to weigh heavily on the business. (Yahoo Finance)
  
  

• Manchester United returns to profit — but debt nears £1.3bn. The historic English football club posted a £32.6m half-year profit, reversing last year’s loss over the same period. However, debt is approaching £1.3bn, largely tied to unpaid player transfer fees. This leaves doubt around plans for a new 100,000 seat stadium that will reportedly cost around £2bn. (BBC)

What the…?

Subway Surfers crashes Coinbase’s earnings call. Earnings calls and Gen Z attention spans don’t usually mix but Coinbase may have just found the answer. During its Q4 results presentation, CEO Brian Armstrong was joined not just by slides — but by gameplay footage of Subway Surfers playing alongside the call, a format TikTok users will be all too familiar with.

The split-screen style is designed to keep viewers hooked for longer, a common trick for podcast clips online. However, this is certainly a first for any multi-billion dollar listed company, but could it be a thing of the future? Some viewers said it was their “first time watching an earnings call in years.” Coinbase shares are up 11% since February 14, so maybe there’s some method to the madness after all. (Yahoo Finance)

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Today’s Insight

Christopher Joye’s view on Bitcoin

This was taken from our recent Basis Points episode titled ‘Christopher Joye sees the world differently: Bitcoin, Interest Rates, Green Bonds & AI Debt’ (Spotify | Apple | YouTube)

Christopher: This is for all the crypto junkies out there. Bitcoin's pure Ponzi. So it has no intrinsic value. It wouldn't surprise me at all if it went to zero one day. Let's just deal with the facts. We use it for nothing. It was proclaimed to be the next great hope for a medium of exchange and we don't use Bitcoin for anything. It was meant to be the mother of all inflation hedges. It proved to be perfectly correlated with inflation. So when we had the huge inflation shock in 2021 to 2024, and it still continues, it felt 80%. It was meant to be a diversifier. It's perfectly correlated with equities. It was meant to be a stable store of wealth. As it turns out, it's the most volatile asset that exists sadly, for the crypto junkies trading actually today below its level in 2021. So if you bought it at the end of 2021, they hate it when I point this out, but it peaked at $68,000 and it's been recently below that level. So you've actually lost money over that period. They claim it's impervious to any security vulnerabilities. But I've argued for a decade, it's not cryptographically secure. That's one of the big concerns. People are now fretting and I've been saying this for 10 years, watch out for quantum computing and that's the new anxiety. 

Today in Equity Mates