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6 October 2025
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Money supply provides an early and good read on whether the cash rate setting is transmitting to accelerating, steady or slowing price pressures. This explores recent data on money supply and what lies ahead for inflation.
Rising prices have a big impact on retirement outcomes yet our most common gauge of inflation – the consumer price index – misses several important household costs for retirees.
Financial commentators seem to have forgotten the leading cause of inflation: growth in the supply of money. Warren Bird explains the link and explores where it suggests inflation is headed.
The consumer price index is supposed to reflect the cost of living but no longer does. The ABS publishes other estimates that provide a more accurate picture of our living expenses, and how much they've recently risen.
It's important to look beyond the short-term volatility caused by military events, inflation, rate hikes, and other daily dramas. Here's how simple, diversified, long term portfolios continue to deliver healthy returns.
Like negative gearing, discounted capital gains tax, especially on residential investment properties, is criticised for giving investors an edge over first-home buyers. A discount is justified but at what level?
Amid the blur of company results, it's vital to step back and check the major factors affecting results: inflation, consumer spending and cashflow. What are the companies emphasising in their one-on-one meetings?
Now we're captivated by inflation and higher rates but only a year ago, investors were certain of the supremacy of US companies, the benign nature of inflation and the remoteness of tighter monetary policy.
A back-to-basics explainer on the challenges arising from the impact of inflation on financial markets, reminding investors to hold some assets that act as a defence against rising inflation.
Why are prices rising but not the CPI? When we measure inflation, we aren’t measuring raw price changes, we’re measuring the pleasure-adjusted or utility-adjusted price changes, and we use it incorrectly.
The 50% CGT discount has little justification during low inflation and it encourages capital gains over income. The preferable system is the indexation in effect prior to 1999, and it will help housing affordability.
It's a difficult task, looking for good ‘inflation plus’ exposure over a long period such as post-retirement. Research into appropriate asset classes shows low correlations make the problem hard to solve.
This AI cycle feels less like a revolution and more like a rerun. Just like fibre in 2000, shale in 2014, and cannabis in 2019, the technology or product is real but the capital cycle will be brutal. Investors beware.
An explosion in low-skilled migration to Australia has depressed wages, killed productivity, and cut rental vacancy rates to near decades-lows. It’s time both sides of politics addressed the issue.
LICs are continuing to struggle with large discounts and frustrated investors are wondering whether it’s worth holding onto them. This explains why the next 6-12 months will be make or break for many LICs.
Australian housing’s 50-year boom was driven by falling rates and rising borrowing power — not rent or yield. With those drivers exhausted, future returns must reconcile with economic fundamentals. Are we ready?
Younger Australians think they’ll need $100k a year in retirement - nearly double what current retirees spend. Expectations are rising fast, but are they realistic or just another case of lifestyle inflation?
This week, I got the news that my mother has dementia. It came shortly after my father received the same diagnosis. This is a meditation on getting old and my regrets in not getting my parents’ affairs in order sooner.