Victoria to spend one in 10 dollars on interest by 2030: Moody’s.
Welcome to Talking Business, a podcast produced in Melbourne Australia, built on the traditional lands of the Kulin Nation. 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 businessacumen.biz
I am Leon Gettler. My job is review and monitor the week’s news in business finance and economics. I bring it all to you every 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 or whatever your favourite podcast platform is.
This is episode number 25 in our series for 2026 and today’s date is Friday July 24.
First, I’ll be talking to Anthony Baker & Finbar O’Hanlon from IonVideo about how their AI driven technology company converts and assembles the data from traditional videos into hyper-personalised offerings. Much like Lego.
And I’ll be talking to CommSec’s equity market strategist James Gruber about the outlook for the Australian and US markets.
But first let’s talk to Anthony Baker & Finbar O’Hanlon
So what’s happening in the news?
Donald Trump is poised to unleash fresh tariffs on dozens of countries as soon as this week, even as his advisers warn him against risking the economic shocks of his original trade war ahead of the midterm elections. US officials have prepared options to allow Trump to launch new tariffs on dozens of countries as the president’s 10% global duties expire later this week, according to people briefed on the plans. Trump on Monday unveiled tariffs of 50% on Canadian goods, having already hit Brazilian imports with a 25% levy, underscoring his continued fixation with using tariffs against trading partners. Fresh tariffs come after the Supreme Court earlier this year struck down the reciprocal levies that were put in place following Trump’s “liberation day” announcement in April 2025. Washington moved to a 10% regime in the wake of the Supreme Court decision this February, but those measures are due to expire on Friday. The new set of fees would be put in place following a probe of forced labour practices, allowing Trump to avoid using the emergency authorities knocked down by the Supreme Court. While the most immediate new duties are expected to be on a par with the 10% tariffs already in place, the administration is also working on other investigations that could grant it the legal authority to propose higher duties. Behind the scenes, senior officials have been counselling the president to maintain stability with trading partners and honour the deals that Washington struck with them to reduce their tariffs in 2025, according to two people familiar with the matter. Trump’s attempt to renew his trade war comes at a time of escalating hostility between the US and Iran, which has roiled global energy markets and risks broadening into a regional conflict. The war has inflicted economic pain on ordinary Americans, pushing petrol prices back to above $4 per gallon this week and risking inflaming voter frustration over the high cost of living. Polling carried out by Focaldata on behalf of the FT earlier this month found more than two-thirds of voters disapproved of how Trump was handling the cost of living. “I think the big influence on tariff rates is the political climate and affordability concerns, which constrain Trump’s ability to escalate,” said Michael Smart, managing director at Rock Creek Global Advisors, an advisory firm in Washington. US officials have tempered many of Trump’s original maximalist tariffs by offering large exemptions for crucial consumer goods, including beef and coffee, and easing some of the levies on products made with steel and aluminium. After two recent trade investigations into critical minerals and aeroplane parts, officials recommended Washington hold negotiations with its trading partners instead of pushing for tariffs. “This does not mean that tariff hikes are in the rear-view mirror,” said Wendy Cutler, a former US trade official who is now senior vice-president at the Asia Society Policy Institute. “But it does suggest that a more cautious approach is now called for, particularly in the lead up to the midterm elections.” The White House and the US trade representative’s office did not respond to a request for comment. The tariffs that could be unveiled this week will fall between 10 per cent and 12.5 per cent on 60 countries over forced labour practices, and were first proposed by US trade officials in June. The US launched the probe — carried out under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 — in March, along with one into excess manufacturing capacity, and has held public hearings into its proposals. That second probe includes the EU, China, Singapore, Switzerland, Norway, Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, South Korea, Vietnam, Taiwan, Bangladesh, Mexico, Japan and India. The new approach to imposing tariffs underscores the way in which the administration must rely on a patchwork of more procedural laws to apply high duties, rather than being able to hit countries with huge tariffs almost instantly under emergency presidential powers.
The world dodged a full-blown energy crisis in the first phase of the Iran conflict — emergency stockpile releases, quiet extra supply from Gulf producers, and China deliberately throttling its imports all bought time. By the time the US and Iran struck their peace deal in June, oil markets actually looked oversupplied. But renewed fighting has traders nervous again, especially over refined fuels like diesel and jet fuel rather than crude itself. US inventories are at their lowest since the 1980s, the Cushing storage hub is near “tank bottoms,” and Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries have squeezed diesel supply even further. The IEA’s Fatih Birol says there’s still a buffer, but it’s not endless — and if the Strait of Hormuz shuts again, that buffer gets tested fast.
Iran’s real leverage, one analyst argues, isn’t its nuclear program — it’s the ability to choke Hormuz with cheap drones and sea mines, a route that carries a fifth of the world’s traded oil. That’s rattling everyone from Gulf producers to Australian motorists. Saudi Arabia and the UAE are racing to expand pipeline bypass routes (Yanbu and Fujairah), but experts say new pipelines take five-plus years and just become new choke points themselves. For Australia specifically, the fallout has meant a $10 billion federal package to boost fuel reserves and build a billion-litre strategic stockpile, plus a push to diversify import sources and lean harder into EVs and renewables as the more durable fix.
Australia’s corporate regulator handed out a record $830 million in civil penalties this past financial year — hitting HSBC, Westpac, Macquarie Securities, Mercer Super and others. But there’s an asterisk: $300 million of that is a fine against Union Standard, a company that’s been in liquidation for six years, so it’s basically uncollectable. ASIC also secured $644 million in remediation for harmed customers and notched 25 criminal convictions, including 11 jail terms — notably a fund manager jailed over insider trading and a financial advisor jailed for stealing client super. New Chair Sarah Court is framing this as proof of a more assertive ASIC, though a law professor cautions the regulator is stretched thin, meaning some of this harm could’ve been prevented if ASIC had moved faster in the first place.
The Albanese government is expanding its planned “Digital Duty of Care” to explicitly cover AI companies — meaning firms like OpenAI and Anthropic could face requirements to do risk assessments and publicly report on the impact of their systems. It’s paired with promises of tougher privacy law, bans on AI-driven price discrimination based on a buyer’s wealth, and oversight of automated government decision-making (think Centrelink). Victoria is going further with its own law to let people unmask and sue anonymous online trolls. The politics here are a balancing act — Labor wants to look tough on AI harms ahead of its national conference, while still courting AI investment and data centre growth. Critics warn the duty-of-care model could effectively kill anonymous online accounts.
KPMG has slapped seven staff and partners with its harshest sanctions yet — fines up to $180,000 — for misusing confidential Optus data while trying to win Telstra’s audit contract. Former audit boss Julian McPherson, who’d already quit in disgrace, is among those fined. It’s a big jump from earlier penalties in the same scandal, where partners caught viewing confidential Lendlease papers were fined as little as $19,000–$40,000. The scandal has already cost KPMG its CEO and chairman, and Treasurer Jim Chalmers is now weighing giving ASIC power to directly fine the big four accounting firms — a sign the fallout could reshape industry regulation, not just KPMG’s internal discipline.
The budget deficit is coming in better than expected — Treasury now expects around $23 billion for the year just finished, down from the $28.3 billion Treasurer Jim Chalmers forecast just weeks ago in the budget. Government debt also landed lower than projected, at $971.4 billion, though it’s still on track to cross the $1 trillion mark this financial year. Chalmers is crediting “responsible economic management,” while Opposition Leader Angus Taylor counters that living standards have taken the biggest hit of any developed nation under this government. The catch: renewed conflict between the US and Iran could undo that good news fast. Oil prices have spiked back above $90 a barrel, the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed to shipping, and petrol here has jumped 15 cents a litre this month alone. Economists reckon we could be back above $2 a litre within a couple of weeks — especially as fuel excise relief winds down on August 2. That’s also a headache for the Reserve Bank, which meets next month; markets currently see a rate rise as unlikely, but rising oil prices keep inflation risk on the table.
Victoria is on track to spend 10 cents of every revenue dollar just on debt interest by 2030 — that’s according to Moody’s. To put that in perspective, it was only about 3.5% back in 2019. So debt servicing costs are set to almost triple. State debt across Australia has exploded since COVID — governments ramped up infrastructure spending, grew the public sector, and handed out cost-of-living relief. Nationally, gross state debt is projected to hit $650 billion by 2026-27, up from $266 billion in 2018-19. Moody’s flags that the Iran conflict is adding fresh pressure — pricier fuel, freight, energy and imported materials are pushing up the cost of building and running infrastructure, right as oil prices pushed above $90 a barrel amid fears over the Strait of Hormuz. It’s got the highest state debt in the country in dollar terms — $215 billion, or roughly 31% of its economic output — despite an economy about a quarter smaller than NSW’s. Economist Shane Oliver’s point is essentially: this is what happens when you don’t save during the good times — you’ve got less buffer for the bad times. The Allan government is under fire ahead of November’s state election. It’s leaned into cost-of-living sweeteners (free/half-price public transport) while pulling back on new mega-projects — partly because big builds like the Suburban Rail Loop have blown out spectacularly (from a projected $50 billion to $125 billion for the first two stages) and got tangled up in organised crime scandals. NSW, Queensland and Victoria — the states with the biggest infrastructure pipelines — are most exposed to further cost overruns. And there’s a flow-on worry: the IMF has warned that ballooning state debt could eventually pressure the Commonwealth’s own credit rating, since ratings agencies effectively treat the federal government as backstopping the states
At Labor’s national conference in Adelaide, the party is set to adopt platform language widely seen as clearing the way for a future gas export tax — even though PM Albanese has downplayed the connection. Backbencher Ed Husic has been actively campaigning for it, backed by the ACTU and the Australia Institute. The government reportedly considered a gas tax during this year’s budget process but held off to avoid friction with gas-importing partners like Japan, South Korea and Malaysia. The Coalition’s Jane Hume says it’s only a matter of time given union pressure, pointing to Albanese’s track record on other tax promises. Separately, there’s also a push at the conference to scrap the diesel fuel excise rebate for mining companies, and the Israeli government is lobbying against parts of Labor’s draft platform relating to language on the Israel-Gaza conflict and the ICC’s findings.
So here’s a wild one for the Aussie auto industry — Toyota’s basically in a street fight with BYD for the title of Australia’s favorite car brand, and Toyota might be losing. Some numbers to set the scene: in June, BYD came within just 243 sales of overtaking Toyota entirely. That’s after two decades of Toyota basically owning this market. Meanwhile Toyota’s sales are down over 21% this year, and across the board, Chinese brands have now overtaken Japan as Australia’s biggest source of vehicles — nearly 40% of all imports in June. What’s driving it? EVs, basically. Petrol prices spiked after the Middle East conflict, and Chinese manufacturers — who build almost exclusively EVs and plug-in hybrids — were perfectly positioned to scoop up that demand. EV sales in Australia have hit five straight monthly records this year, now sitting at over 23% of new car sales, and about 80% of those are made in China. Toyota’s problem is it bet on a “multi-pathway” strategy — hedging across hybrids, hydrogen, and EVs instead of going all-in on batteries. Which sounds sensible, except it meant they didn’t launch their first EV in Australia until February 2024. Way behind. They’re scrambling to catch up now — four new hybrid and electric models added in July, including an electric HiLux, plus more EVs on the way through 2027. They’ve also fixed a lot of their pandemic-era wait time issues; some models had blown out to two-year waits, and they’ve now got that down to three-to-six months. But here’s the sceptical take from industry analysts: it might just be too late. One EV market tracker put it bluntly — demand shifted faster than most legacy carmakers could keep up with, and he thinks we’ll actually see some Japanese brands exit the Australian market altogether, the way it’s already happening in China. Toyota’s counter-argument is basically: reputation and infrastructure. They’ve got 270+ dealerships, they’re leaning hard into their “we don’t leave rural customers behind” messaging, and they just dropped $40 million redeveloping their old Altona plant into a parts centre. But BYD’s not sitting still either — they’re explicitly targeting regional Australia now, growing their dealer network from 112 sites toward 150 by year’s end. Their local CEO’s message is basically “we want to win the same customers Toyota’s always relied on.” So — great David-and-Goliath story for the segment, except Goliath’s the one playing catch-up.
And that’s it for this week.
And next week, I’ll be talking to Natasha Mandie from EM Advisory. With almost 30 years’ experience in corporate advisory and investment banking, Natasha brings a practical and commercially grounded perspective on strategic decision-making. We think she’d offer valuable insights into how business leaders can make better decisions when the stakes are highest.
And I’ll be talking to RMIT professor Mark Gregory about the Telstra outage.
For the most exclusive access to leading economists and business leaders from around the world, subscribe to Talking Business from my website leongettler.com or whatever your favourite podcast platform is.
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