Clive Palmer’s Trumpet of Patriots has outspent the LNP and Labor for this election. $16.3 million. For what?
Welcome to Talking Business, a podcast produced in Melbourne Australia. The podcast is available on the Acast site, my own website, the Apple Podcast store or wherever you go to get your podcasts. Or you can get it at the Business Acumen website at www.businessacumen.biz
For the most exclusive access to leading economists and business leaders from around the world, subscribe to Talking Business from my website leongettler.com.
I am Leon Gettler. My job is to review and monitor the week’s news in business, finance and economics. I bring it all to you, every week.
This is episode number 12 in our series for 2025 and today’s date is Friday May 2.
And next week I’ll be talking to Robert Lockyer, the CEO and founder of Delta Global – the leading supplier of luxury sustainable packaging globally. Utilising their data intelligence platform, AI and design-led team, Delta Global support the packaging and sustainability efforts of some of the biggest retailers and household names internationally – and future proofing their business.
And I’ll be talking to AMP Capital chief economist Shane Oliver about how the market is performing in the wake Trump’s tariff wars, with Trump’s unpredictability.
But first, let’s talk to Robert Lockyer.
So what’s happening in the news?
Nearly four weeks into a costly global trade war with no end in sight, Mr. Trump is facing a barrage of lawsuits from state officials, small businesses and even once-allied political groups, all contending that the president cannot sidestep Congress and tax virtually any import at levels to his liking. The lawsuits carry great significance, not just because the tariffs have roiled financial markets and threatened to plunge the United States into a recession. The legal challenges also stand to test Mr. Trump’s claims of expansive presidential power, while illustrating the difficult calculation that his opponents face in deciding whether to fight back and risk retribution. None of the lawsuits filed this month are supported by major business lobbying groups, even though many organizations — including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable — have been sharply critical of the president’s tariffs and lobbied to lessen their impact. The latest lawsuit arrived Thursday from the Pacific Legal Foundation, a group with reported ties to the conservative donor Charles Koch. On behalf of a clothing company, a board game designer and other small businesses, the group faulted Mr. Trump for imposing an “unlawful and unconstitutional” 145% tariff on Chinese goods, resulting in higher prices for American businesses. Jamey Stegmaier, a co-founder of Stonemaier Games and a plaintiff in the case, said his company had more than 250,000 board games and other products on order that it could not easily import from China, unless it was willing to pay a “total tariff tax of around $1.5 million.” The decision to sue was the “right thing” but still a difficult choice, Mr. Stegmaier said, citing a fear of retribution from Mr. Trump. “It’s kind of a scary proposition to oppose the administration right now,” he said. Another legal group with ties to Mr. Koch and the conservative financier Leonard A Leo sued early this month on behalf of a Florida company facing high costs from the president’s tariffs on China. Mr. Leo is a co-chairman of the Federalist Society, which has advised Mr. Trump on judicial appointments. At the heart of the legal wrangling is a 1970s law, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which enables the president to order trade embargoes, set sanctions and limit foreign investment to ward off adversaries abroad. No president before Mr. Trump had ever imposed such import taxes under the emergency law, which does not once mention the word “tariff.” That omission has set the stage for a series of pivotal legal clashes, hinging in part on whether the law truly empowers the president “without actually, explicitly saying tariffs,” said Ted Murphy, a co-leader of the global arbitration, trade and advocacy practice at the law firm Sidley Austin.
Apple aims to make most of its iPhones sold in the United States at factories in India by the end of 2026, and is speeding up plans to navigate potentially away from higher tariffs in China, its main manufacturing base. Apple sells over 60 million iPhones in the U.S. annually with roughly 80% of them made in China. Currently. Apple has already stepped up production in India to beat U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs, shipping some 600 tons of iPhones worth $ 2 billion to the United States in March. The shipments from India marked a record for both its contractors Tata and Foxconn, with the latter alone accounting for smartphones worth $1.3 billion. In April, the U.S. administration imposed 26% duties on imports from India, much lower than the more than 100% China was facing at the time. Washington has since paused most duties for three months, except for China.
In Australia’s election, Clive Palmer’s Trumpet of Patriots has outspent all other parties, according to data by Nielsen and RCS Media Monitoring. The total spend for Palmer in these weeks was $16.3m. Neither of the major parties went close to that with the Liberals outspending Labor, $5.9m to $5.5m.
Labor has announced its own raid on the public sector to help pay for a $7.2 billion blowout in pre-election promises. This coincides with a warning by Standard & Poor’s that Australia’s AAA credit rating may be at risk if debt and deficit worsen. With the race for budget supremacy to feature in the final days before Saturday’s election, Treasurer Jim Chalmers pledged to save $6.4 billion over the next four years by reducing the government’s reliance on consultants and other services, and raise another $760 million through increased student visa fees. The crackdown on the use of consultants, contractors and labour hire, as well as travel, hospitality and property expenses, contrasts with Peter Dutton’s plan to save $10 billion by paring back the federal public service by 41,000 positions over the next five years. “They want to sack tens of thousands of people providing essential services,” Chalmers said. “What we’re talking about is not about winding back people, not about winding back their pay, not about winding back programs, but finding savings in other areas.” On the other side of the fence Shadow treasurer Angus Taylor, who will release his policy costings this week promising a stronger bottom line, revealed that if elected, the Coalition would hand down a mini-budget in the second half of next year, focused further on budget repair. Both sides were effectively put on notice by Standard & Poor’s, which said debt-funded election spending, risked the nation’s prized AAA credit ranking. The Albanese government was accused of hiding the full extent of the fiscal deterioration through $104 billion of so-called “off budget” spending for items such as the National Broadband Network, Snowy Hydro, Clean Energy Finance Corporation, National Reconstruction Fund, Housing Australia and Labor’s pledge to waive $16 billion of student loans. “The budget is already regressing to moderate deficits as public spending hits postwar highs, global trade tensions intensify, and growth slows,” S&P analyst Anthony Walker said in a report on Monday. “How the elected government funds its campaign pledges and rising spending will be crucial for maintaining the [AAA] rating.
Australia’s most successful rare earths miner and the key global alternative to China’s stranglehold on supply has savaged the Albanese government’s plan to create a critical minerals stockpile. Amanda Lacaze, chief executive of Lynas Rare Earths, suggested the government was trying to set itself up as a competitor to her company, with the risk it will undercut Lynas on pricing when it tries to sell products to non-Chinese customers. She warned the policy could also prop up unviable projects. “From our perspective, the proposed policy will not suddenly transform uneconomic projects into economic projects … it will not underwrite sustained success,” she said. Lacaze said that despite Lynas being Australia’s only producer of rare earths, the government had not briefed the company on its stockpile policy, let alone consulted her. Labor announced last week that it will invest $1.2 billion in national offtake agreements and selective stockpiling to secure a strategic supply of the critical minerals that are most important to Australia’s national security and that of its key partners. This strategy will focus on supplies of the rare earth elements that are vital for advanced technology, such as electric vehicles, weaponry, robots, wind turbines and semi-conductor chips powering AI.
Building products giant James Hardie remains under attack from investors over its $14bn deal to buy US rival Azek, amid concern a new set of corporate governance pledges may fail to restore confidence among shareholders. James Hardie has come under fire for sanctioning the merger deal without putting it to an investor vote, prompting the Australian Securities Exchange to more broadly review shareholder approvals required for companies to embark on takeovers. The building products supplier had planned to move its primary listing to New York from Australia but on Monday said it would not seek a foreign-exempt listing status and would hold a vote before any decision to delist. Shareholder advisory firm Ownership Matters – which wrote a letter on behalf of Australia’s top investors, attacking the ASX decision to waive through the merger without a vote – said trust in James Hardie had been eroded with institutional investors. As part of the deal, James Hardie planned to move its primary listing from the ASX to New York, although investors will be able to retain share exposure here under a local CDI listing. Allan Gray managing director Simon Mawhinney, who co-signed the investor letter earlier in April, said the current ASX listing rule and the application of waivers was a “nonsense” for shareholders. “It doesn’t seem like it serves shareholders well. I think the only thing it serves well are investment bankers and lawyers,” Mr Mawhinney said. .
More than 31,000 passwords belonging to Australian customers of the Big Four banks are being shared amongst cyber criminals online, often for free. Despite the anti-fraud protections in place at those banks, cybersecurity experts warn victims could “definitely” lose money as a result. An investigation by cyber intelligence researchers has shown credentials belonging to at least 14,000 Commbank customers, 7,000 ANZ customers, 5,000 NAB and 4,000 Westpac customers are available on the messaging platform Telegram and the dark web. It comes in the wake of recent attacks on Australian superannuation funds, where hackers stole from pensioners and used leaked passwords to try to gain access to members’ accounts. The Australian firm Dvuln, which made the discovery, said the passwords were stolen directly from users’ devices, which had been infected with a type of malware known as an “infostealer”. Infostealer malware, as the name suggests, is a type of malicious software tailor-made to infect a device, harvest as much valuable data as possible and deliver it directly to criminals. It overwhelmingly targets computers running on Windows and, as well as passwords, can capture credit card details, cryptocurrency wallets, local files, and browser data, including cookies, user history and autofill details. The use of infostealers has exploded in recent years. Hudson Rock said there were now more than 58,000 infected devices in Australia and more than 31 million infections globally. The company arrived at the figure by counting all infected devices, rather than just those belonging to banking customers. A recent analysis from cybersecurity firm KELA found that globally, at least 3.9 billion passwords had been stolen using the technique. It’s been dubbed “the silent heist” by the Australian Signals Directorate.
Jayne Hrdlicka, the former Virgin Australia chief executive will take over as managing director of Endeavour, which runs the Dan Murphy’s and BWS liquor chains and a portfolio of pubs, from next year, marking her return to the business after more than two decades. As a Bain consultant, Hrdlicka advised Woolworths on its liquor strategy in the early 2000s, which ultimately led to the creation of Endeavour, spun out in 2021. Hrdlicka stepped down as the chief executive of Virgin this year, having navigated the airline into a major tie-up with Qatar Airways and towards an ASX listing. She had run the airline since it was acquired out of administration by Bain Capital during the COVID-19 pandemic. Endeavour will be as big a challenge for Hrdlicka as Virgin was when it was in administration. Endeavour has faced sluggish retail sales as higher mortgage payments, rents and grocery bills cut into spending at bottle shops. Its strategy of opening smaller, more upmarket Dan Murphy’s stores – such as one at Martin Place in the Sydney CBD – has also been questioned by investors. Dan Murphy’s and BWS make up more than 80% of sales.
Australian consumer prices rose slightly more than expected in the first quarter, but annual core inflation still slowed to a three-year low and added to the case for another cut in interest rates next month. Australians can now expect a quarter-point rate cut from the Reserve Bank of Australia on May 20 given the darkening outlook for global growth caused largely by U.S. tariffs. Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday showed the consumer price index (CPI) rose 0.9% in the March quarter, just above forecasts of a 0.8% increase. Annual CPI inflation held steady at 2.4%. However, and this is important, the annual pace of the trimmed mean slowed to 2.9%, from 3.3%, taking it back into the Reserve Bank of Australia’s 2% to 3% target band. That’s happened for the first time since late 2021. The benign readings would be a positive for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese whose Labor Party is running on the credentials of bringing down sky-high inflation ahead of a tightly held federal election on Saturday. The RBA skipped a chance to move in April but opened the door to a rate cut next month by noting the May meeting would be an opportunity to revisit monetary policy settings.
And that’s it for this week.
And next week, I’ll be talking to Dr Arne Geschke, the Co-Founder and CTO of the Australian tech startup, Fair Supply, Dr Geschke will talk about how his firm’s Supply Chain Tariff Calculator can help Australian businesses navigate ongoing trade tensions and supply chain chaos by calculating the full impact of tariffs across multi-tiered and highly intertwined supply chains throughout all tariff points. By using the calculator, businesses can estimate how the tariff will affect them and enable comparisons between other countries to identify the most cost-effective sourcing options.
And I’ll be talking to Independent economist Craig James about what’s happening in the market next week.
For the most exclusive access to leading economists and business leaders from around the world, subscribe to Talking Business from my website leongettler.com
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Looking forward to the next episode of Talking Business.
