- Equity Mates
- Posts
- 📈 The Uninspired Employed: Australia's wellbeing crisis | Wikramanayake retires as Macquarie CEO
📈 The Uninspired Employed: Australia's wellbeing crisis | Wikramanayake retires as Macquarie CEO
Here's what you need to know today
The Big Picture
The Uninspired Employed: Australia adds 76,000 jobs while dissatisfaction rises. Australia is now at a record number of jobs at 14.8 million, while unemployment remained at 4.4%, below the 10-year average of 5.4%. However, the number of Australians reporting very low life satisfaction has doubled since 2014, and average satisfaction sits at 7.1, lower than the 7.2 reported during the Covid pandemic in 2020. (Guardian | ABS)
Labor establishes Fair Work Court to expedite labour disputes. The court will relieve some of the burden from the strained Fair Work Commission and will be presided over by specialist workplace judges. Unions applauded the move, which they say will resolve disputes faster and at lower costs, making legal rectification less punishing for employees. (AFR)
US inks landmark nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia. The agreement will help Saudi Arabia develop a civilian nuclear programme in what the US Department of Energy declared a “decades-long, multibillion-dollar partnership. However, critics say it opens the door to nuclear weapon development as it lacks certain “gold standard” safety protocols. (FT)
Houthis strike two Saudi tankers in Red Sea. This marks the first attacks by the Iranian-backed rebels since they declared a maritime blockade over the Bab al-Mandab Strait earlier this week. The Houthi attacks come after 12 consecutive days of US strikes on Iran. Tankers are now trapped in the Red Sea, with at least seven having had to turn around. (BBC)
Germany follows US lead, will invest in defence start-ups. This comes as the government seeks boost innovation and productivity in the manufacturing-heavy German economy, which has been hit by Chinese competition. Responses were mixed, with some critics saying the government could support the start-ups by just buying from them. (FT)
Inflation concerns mount as US 30-year yield remains over 5%. At 12 consecutive days, the yield on US 30-year Treasury bonds is on its longest streak above 5% since 2007. This highlights investor concerns about America’s increasingly worrisome debt crisis and the inflation that would follow should the US need to print money to escape its debts. (AFR)
Companies in the news
Macquarie CEO retires, ending historic career. Shemara Wikramanayake will depart from her post after eight years in the top job at Australia’s largest investment bank. She was the first woman to lead Macquarie Group, was consistently in the top highest paid Australian CEOs, and oversaw a 150% increase in Macquarie’s market capitalisation. Happy retirement, Shemara! (AFR)
Chinese AI used to halt rogue OpenAI model. After an experimental OpenAI model broke containment and hacked a startup, it has been revealed that a Chinese model, GLM-5.2, was used to contain the attack because top US models refused to handle hack data. Chinese models are increasingly threatening to unseat US models’ dominance, highlighted by Kimi K3’s success earlier this week. (AFR | ABC)
Google, Tesla drop as investors sour on heavy AI spend. Google reported its first cash flow-negative quarter, burning US$6 billion of cash as it piled investment into AI infrastructure. Tesla is also ramping up AI spend with a planned $25 billion in 2026, nearly triple its 2025 spend. Overinvestment fears bubbled up, sending both companies down 1%. (FT | Capital Brief)
Copper pure-play Sandfire reports record revenue. Australia’s largest copper pure-play company reported a 38% increase in copper production for the quarter, driving revenues to $821 million. The stock rose 4% on the news. (Capital Brief)
Leaked Firmus plans foreshadow water fight with farmers. Farmers are asking the data centre firm to be a good corporate citizen after an inadvertently published note revealed Firmus plans to tap into the state-owned irrigation scheme. (ABC)
Have you got your ticket to FinFest 2026?
The market is closed and the bar is open. Come trade ideas at Australia’s biggest investing festival.
1,200 people have already secured their tickets to FinFest. Make sure you do before they sell out.
You’ll hear from some of Australia’s best investors and entrepreneurs and leave with the knowledge and confidence to take the next step in your investing journey.
This is going to be big. You don’t want to miss this.
The ethical arms dealer
In a marked turn of morality, the head of an ethical fintech has been caught arranging arms deals with a Russian spy. Zeiad Idris founded Algbra, a people-first digital banking platform, before offering to help raise nearly $3 billion to acquire Russian military equipment and sell it overseas.
An Algbra advertisement that aired last year made a cute play on words that arms are for hugs. Looks like Idris was just arranging $3 billion worth of hugs for his overseas buyers. (FT)
Retirement is more than numbers on a page
Financial adviser Dylan Pargiter-Green from Bold Wealth had some words for anxious investors (and baked bean lovers) about keeping what matters in mind.
Ren: For younger people or with a bit longer to retirement, how important is it to think about lifestyle and what you want out of retirement and stuff like that?
Dylan: A thousand percent lifestyle is so important. It's more important than the numbers on the page, right? Because effectively the money and the numbers on the page is what allows us to have the lifestyle that we want to live.
Depending on your retirement goal and what you're trying to do, you're effectively making sacrifices early to have more lifestyle later at a sooner point or you're living a life throughout your entire working journey to have that constantly and maybe not to the same degree that you might have had it if you make those sacrifices, but it's a balance and lifestyle is what we spend our money on.
We don't make money in order to have zeros in the bank and just sit there and look at it every night, smile to ourselves whilst we're munching on a tin of baked beans.
Want to work with an adviser like Dylan to figure out your retirement-lifestyle balance? Fill out the form on our website and we’ll match you with one of our hand-picked advisers to help you get started.
