Enjoy this email? We’d love you to forward it to someone else who may enjoy it.

Forwarded this email? You can sign up here. 

Here’s what you need to know today

• Australia voted on Saturday and the outcome was resounding: Anthony Albanese was re-elected as Prime Minister, his Labor party gained at least 10 seats (with some still too close to call), and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton one of 10 sitting Coalition members to lose their seat so far. (ABC News)
  
  

• Over the weekend, Woodstock for Capitalists took place in Omaha, Nebraska as Warren Buffett spoke to an arena full of shareholders at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting. The biggest takeaway? The 94-year-old billionaire announced he would like to retire by the end of the year. Buffett reiterated his preference that Greg Abel, the executive currently managing all non-insurance businesses, should succeed him as CEO. (ABC News)
  
  

• The US stock market closed Friday with its 9th consecutive winning day, the market’s longest winning streak since 2004. The S&P 500 was up 1.5% on better-than-expected jobs data and further softening of trade war rhetoric between the US and China. The S&P 500 has now recovered and is up 0.3% since Trump’s Liberation Day tariff announcement. (PBS)
  
  

• Apple and Amazon reported earnings on Friday and both beat estimates from Wall Street. Apple’s earnings-per-share was up 8% while Amazon’s was up 62%. So far Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, Apple and Amazon have all beaten estimates in this reporting season as Big Tech keeps getting bigger.
  
  

• One US-listed stock that didn’t have a good Friday was Australian tech company Atlassian. The company saw shares fall 17% after it reported quarterly earnings, with forecasts softer than expected and investors concerned about a plan for the company to give its AI tools away for free to business customers. The stock recovered somewhat throughout the day to finish down 9%. (AFR)
  
  

• US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to allow deep-sea mining in US and international waters, ignoring an international treaty that has prevented such efforts in the past. The Trump Administration has been focused on finding alternative sources of critical metals where production or processing is controlled by China. (ABC News)
  
  

• Ireland’s Data Protection Commission fined TikTok €530m for illegally transferring European user data to China. The Irish regulator also reported that the tech company failed to show that Chinese authorities could not access Europeans’ personal information. (Politico)

What the…?

Anthony Albanese may have been re-elected as Australian Prime Minister, but he wasn’t the only winner for the recent election campaign. Alphabet-owned YouTube saw advertising spending from the two major parties double the 2022 election.

With one week to go, the video streaming platform had already pulled in more than $16.5 million in political advertising. The major parties found themselves in an arms race with Clive Palmer’s Trumpet of Patriots who spent more than $5 million and drove up advertising cost on the platform. (Capital Brief)

Investing is a lifelong journey

Here’s what you can learn today.

Getting your emergency fund right

Community Question: How much should I have in my emergency fund?

We put this question to Jacob McCudden, financial adviser at Back-to-Back Financial Planning.

Depends completely on you and your financial position.

A general rule of thumb would be to aim for 6 months’ worth of essential living expenses (e.g. rent/mortgage, bills, cost of living, etc.), but this is really just the starting point.

These funds should be held 100% in cash. Term deposits are ok, but can take time to break (potentially a month), so the best place is typically a savings account (i.e. something that pays interest, rather than a transaction account that typically pays no interest these days). You could even hold it with a different bank to your usual bank if that helps with any “temptations” to dip into it.

Remember, this money is not intended to “earn a return.” The interest it earns just helps it keep up with inflation (generally). What it is intended to do, is avoid the need to ever have to use “bad debt” (e.g. personal loan, credit card, etc.) and should very much be seen as the “break glass in case of emergency” fund. That is, it’s not for the yearly holiday, it’s not for the new car, it is an emergency fund that should be used for emergencies or unexpected expenses (e.g. car breaks down, washing machine blows up, etc.).

Most importantly, an emergency fund gives you “financial confidence” and studies have shown the positive benefit on people’s mental health due to the confidence they gain knowing that if there was an emergency, they would be ok. The stress and damaging impacts on mental health of living “day-to-day” or “paycheque-to-paycheque” are well known.

Lastly, having an emergency fund potentially means you can have lower personal risk insurance premiums as you’ve built up a buffer yourself and thus can have a longer waiting period on any income protection policies you may hold (an emergency fund is really a risk management tool, rather than an “investment” per se).

It also demonstrates a good history of building genuine savings (this helps with future credit applications, like a home loan), not to mention it requires discipline and self-control to build an emergency fund in the first place, both extremely important skills to develop on your path to financial freedom!

Interested in speaking to one of our hand-picked financial advisers? Fill out the form on our website and we’ll put you in touch.

Today’s sponsor is Scouting Australia Podcast

Join Sammy Gordon, Equity Mates’ regular property expert, as he’s joined by Jimmy Ibrahim to unpack the real driver behind success in investing: mindset.

From fear and hesitation to clarity and confidence, they explore how education, strategy, and your inner circle can shape your journey. Whether you're starting out or scaling up, this episode is packed with insights on pushing past fear and taking bold action.

Tune into this empowering Scouting Australia Podcast episode on all your favourite platforms.

Want more Equity Mates?