TGIF! It’s Keira here in Sydney with all the latest news to end your week. We also have a new podcast about the ASX stock that’s soared a staggering 500% this year. But first...
Billionaire HarryTriguboff has built more reasonably-priced homes than almost anyone else in Sydney, but he’s also been long derided for reshaping the city’s suburbs in ways some residents resent. Sydney bureau chief Ainslie Chandler takes a deeper look into the Triguboff paradox.
BHP soldat least four iron ore cargoes to Chinese traders this week despite a dispute with the nation’s powerful state buyer, traders with knowledge of the transactions told Bloomberg. Meanwhile, at the miner’s AGM yesterday, Chair Ross McEwan said commercial negotiations were ongoing, noting that previous talks had taken as long as six months.
Ross McEwan at BHP’s AGM.
Photographer: Carla Gottgens/Bloomberg
Woodside Energy shares jumped yesterday after it sold stakes in its Louisiana liquefied natural gas export plant and a connected pipeline to Williams, an American energy infrastructure company. Williams expects to invest about $1.9 billion to help develop the pipeline and LNG facilities.
Australia’s defense tech sector has a new star. DroneShield has seen its stock soar more than 500% this year, catapulting the Sydney-based company from a niche player to an ASX 200 member. In our latest podcast, Rebecca Jones talks to Ainslie Chandler and reporter Carmeli Argana about DroneShield’s journey from meme stock to military mainstay.
Fortescue is emerging as the frontrunner to acquire a stake in a Spanish solar power portfolio owned by energy giant Iberdrola SA, our colleagues in Europe reported overnight. Meanwhile, the Australian company’s shipments of iron ore increased 4% in its first quarter as Chinese demand held up.
What happened overnight
A rally in big tech drove stocks higher as trade tensions cooled ahead of a reading on consumer prices, with equity investors shrugging off concerns about any potential impacts of an oil spike on inflation. Bonds fell. Australian stocks look set for a fairly steady open this morning.
The White House announced that US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping will meet next Thursday on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, as the leaders of the world’s two largest economies look to deescalate a simmering trade war.
Oil posted its biggest one-day gain in more than four months after the US announced sanctions on Russia’s top oil companies, threatening supplies from one of the world’s top producing countries.
French President Emmanuel Macron told European Union leaders to consider using the bloc’s most powerful trade tool against China if they aren’t able to find a resolution to Beijing’s planned export controls on critical raw materials.
Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao has received a pardon from Donald Trump, one of the the biggest moves yet by the president to fully embrace the crypto industry and give legal reprieves to some of its most prominent people.
What to watch
• RBA Governor Michele Bullock is due to give remarks in Sydney at 11:05 a.m.
One more thing...
The final year of Donald Trump’s first presidency kicked off a boom in so-called special purpose acquisition companies, with hundreds reaching the market. Founders have raised more than $24 billion since the November election, easily exceeding the past two years combined.
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