Economic and market news
In Australian economic and market news this week, the latest quarterly inflation data was said to have put pay to any thoughts of interest rate cuts by the Reserve Bank of Australia. The figures show that inflation increased by 1 per cent in the three months to end-March, and 3.6 per cent over the year. This was an acceleration over the first quarter of 2024, from the 0.6 per cent rise in the December 2023 quarter. There have been some increases in goods prices, but it is the price of services that is of most concern to the RBA. Rising wages are a key cost pressure in those sectors. In this quarter, the most significant contributors to inflation were education, health, housing and food and non-alcoholic beverages.
Price pressures have fallen from the peak of 7.8 per cent in December 2022. However, the ‘last mile’ to bring inflation within the target (of 2-3 per cent) is notoriously difficult and central banks across the developed world are facing the same difficulties in suppressing price pressures.
Australian indices
ASX 200: Rose fell slightly, 0.25 per cent over the week to close at 7664.1 points on Tuesday.
All Ordinaries: Was almost unchanged, falling 0.07 per cent in the period, closing at 7932.0 points on Tuesday.
Government Bonds
Government Bond Yields (Source: Bloomberg)
|
NAME |
COUPON |
PRICE |
YIELD |
1 DAY |
1 MONTH |
1 YEAR |
|
GTAUD2Y:GOV Australia Bond 2 Year Yield |
4.25
|
100.29 |
4.09% |
-7 |
+34 |
+106 |
|
GTAUD5Y:GOV Australia Bond 5 Year Yield |
3.25 |
96.22 |
4.09% |
-7 |
+49 |
+101 |
|
GTAUD10Y:GOV Australia Bond 10 Year Yield |
3.75 |
94.59 |
4.42% |
-6 |
+46 |
+109 |
|
GTAUD15Y:GOV Australia Bond 15 Year Yield |
3.25 |
85.37 |
4.45% |
-7 |
+42 |
+90 |
Reserve Bank of Australia (Source:RBA)
|
RBA CASH RATE TARGET (RBATCTR:IND) CURRENT (per cent) |
MOST RECENT DECISION (percentage points) |
MOST RECENT CHANGE (percentage points) |
1 YEAR PRIOR (per cent) |
|
4.35 |
+0 (19 March 2024) |
+0.25 (7 November 2023) |
3.60 |
Currencies (source:RBA)
As at the close on 30 April, the AUD/USD was up 1.08 per cent over the week, closing at 0.6525 on Tuesday. The AUD/RMB was up 1.06 per cent, in the period, closing at 4.7264 on Tuesday.
Venture Capital
ENA Respiratory
Stoic investee ENA Respiratory has made the exciting announcement that the US Food and Drug Administration has issued a ‘safe to proceed’ notice for a Phase 1b study of its dry powder formulation of INNA-05. This virus-agnostic intranasal antiviral host defence immunomodulator is a first-in-class drug that has the potential to address an unmet need as a complementary approach to available vaccines and direct-acting antivirals, which are often virus-specific.
Morse Micro
Stoic investee Morse Micro announced that it has opened a new office in Taiwan.
Property
This week’s data on the residential property market suggest that buyers are not totally put off by the latest view that any cut in interest rates may now be some way off. New data show that 72.9 per cent of properties that went to auction this week sold. This was down 1.5 percentage points on the week before, but was supported by a surge in Sydney’s preliminary clearance rate to 78.3 per cent, up from 73.8 per cent the prior week.
