Here’s what you need to know today

• Former Labor leader Bill Shorten announced he would quit politics in February to become the Vice Chancellor of the University of Canberra. But our biggest surprise: just how much university vice chancellors are paid:

  

  Source: Sydney Morning Herald

• Michele Bullock goes bang! Firing back at Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ comments that the RBA’s actions were “smashing the economy”, the RBA Governor has argued the alternative to higher interest rates is a recession. In the midst of our economic crisis we probably didn’t the RBA Governor and Australian Treasurer sub-tweeting each other in the media.
  
  

• Governor Bullock’s speech was titled ‘The Cost of High Inflation’ and she did not mince her words, acknowledging that higher rates would force some home owners to sell their homes as the RBA focused on getting inflation under control.
  
  

• Google is developing an artificial intelligence model that (they claim) could diagnose respiratory ailments by listening to a recording of a cough. The model is being trained on 300 million recordings to pick out patterns or sounds in different coughs. (This story gave us a bit of deja vu, reminding us of ASX-listed ResApp that promised something similar and was acquired by Pfizer in 2022)
  
  

• Volvo is the latest car maker to walk back their electric vehicle targets. Originally, the company was planning to go all-electric by 2030. Now, it has re-set a target of 90% electric vehicle sales by 2030. Volvo isn’t the only car maker to walk back ambitious EV targets - Ford, GM, Mercedes, Volkswagen - plenty of car makers have done a similar walk-back this year.
  
  

• The number of job openings in America has hit a 3-and-a-half year low. This is another sign that the US economy is losing steam after powering on for so long through rising rates and a cost-of-living crisis.
  
  

• Despite being in the top 5 largest exporters of natural gas globally and demand for natural gas actually falling, Australia is preparing to import natural gas within the next two years. The ABC has the explainer.

What the…?

Over dating apps? Maybe you should consider this Spanish trend that has led to a shortage of pineapples across the country.

Single Spaniards are congregating in supermarkets between 7pm and 8pm at night and signalling their intentions with an upside down pineapple in their trolley. Whatever works, we guess?

Investing is a lifelong journey

Here’s what you can learn today.

China's advanced chipmaking efforts could take a hit from a U.S. ally

As we watch the rise-and-further-rise of semiconductor stocks, it has become clear just how reliant the global semiconductor supply chain is on just a few companies. There is the best-in-class chip designer, Nvidia, and the best-in-class foundry, TSMC. But perhaps no company is more important to the global semiconductor supply chain than ASML.

ASML is a Dutch company that makes lithography machines, that semiconductor foundries like TSMC and Samsung use to create their most advanced chips. In the most recent quarter, almost half of ASML’s revenue came from sales to China. That may be about to change.

As US-China tensions escalate, the US is putting more pressure on its allies to restrict trade with China. Reports are that there is a particular focus on semiconductors, where China is trying desperately to catch up to the West, and the US is putting the most pressure on Japan and the Netherlands.

ASML is already restricted from selling their most advanced lithography machines to China, the EUVs that are used to make chips for Nvidia and Apple. However, the DUVs that ASML are able to sell and service in China may soon be cut off. In turn, cutting off China from a critical component for their foundries and setting their semiconductor program back years.

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