Reporting season live updates: All the latest news from the ASX as companies deliver their financial reports

WA’s iron ore majors were all dragged lower today as the commodity so crucial to Australia (and WA’s) economic fortunes retreated further below $US100 a tonne.

The steel-making ingredient tumbled back below $US100 a tonne yesterday and futures fell 1.7 per cent to $US96.85/t today.

Fortescue took the biggest hit on the ASX, shedding 3.7 per cent to $17.49 by 1.10pm.

BHP lost 2.5 per cent to $39.75 and Rio Tinto was off by the same measure to $112.50.

Mineral Resources, which is shuttering its Yigarn operations but has opened uo a new front in the Pilbara through its Onslow Iron hub, dropped 1.9 per cent to $47.66.

The falls come as the world’s biggest steel producer, China’s Baowu, warned the industry in the Middle Kingdom is facing a crisis more serious than the downturns of 2008 and 2015.

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A multibillion-dollar manufacturing boost will set up Australia’s economy for decades, the Prime Minister says.

As debate continued in Federal Parliament on the Government’s signature Future Made in Australia policy, Anthony Albanese said it would be the catalyst for investment not only at home but in overseas markets.

The strategy will spend more than $22 billion over 10 years and aims to safeguard Australian control over the resources and manufacturing sectors.

As part of the plan, the Government will aim to invest in emerging industries such as parts of the renewable energy sector as nations shift towards net-zero.

“We can choose to carry on as we are, to stay in our lane and be satisfied with our lot and watch the world move past us, or we can actually move forward,” Mr Albanese told Parliament today.

“This is the decisive decade for our nation’s future. We are in our moment right now, and we must seize it.”

Projects funded under the strategy would be determined by a national interest framework, as well as ensure jobs would be safe and well paid.

The manufacturing strategy formed the centrepiece of the Government’s Budget handed down in May.

Mr Albanese said as other nations moved towards net-zero economies, Australia had the opportunity to be a leading player in the transition.

Clean Energy Council chief executive Kane Thornton said the Future Made in Australia laws were essential to the future of the economy.

“These new industries provide an opportunity to build a new economic foundation for Australia that can ultimately substitute declining international demand for and revenues from, fossil fuels,” he said.

Saxo Asia Pacific senior sales trader Junvum Kim says competitive pressures at Commonwealth Bank are significantly impacting its net interest margin - down 8 basis points year on year to 1.99 per cent - leading to half-on-half declines across nearly all units.

“Furthermore, the rise in impairment provisions is emerging as a notable negative factor,” he said.

CBA earlier CBA reported cash net profit after tax of $9.836 billion, down 2 per cent year on year.

New Zealand’s central bank cut interest rates, embarking on an easing cycle much sooner than previously indicated as the economy slumps and inflation slows.

The Reserve Bank’s monetary policy committee lowered the official cash rate by a quarter percentage point to 5.25 per cent Wednesday in Wellington.

Nine of 23 economists in a Bloomberg survey anticipated the move, while 14 expected no change. The RBNZ’s new forecasts show the average rate falling to 4.92 per cent in the fourth quarter and to 4.36 per cent by the middle of next year.

“New Zealand’s annual consumer price inflation is returning to within the monetary policy committee’s one to 3 per cent target band,” the RBNZ said.

“The pace of further easing will depend on the committee’s confidence that pricing behaviour remains consistent with a low inflation environment, and that inflation expectations are anchored around the 2 per cent target.”

The RBNZ’s pivot to easing is a rapid change of tune after it said in May it considered raising rates and wouldn’t cut them until the second half of 2025. The bank’s concerns over sticky domestic inflation are being alleviated as the economy teeters on the brink of its third recession in less than two years and unemployment rises.

Bloomberg

“It is also probably one of the clear forms of productivity gains when you look at what infrastructure can do — it’s got a lot of benefits.”

That’s the word from Seven Group Holdings’ CEO Ryan Stokes, who is eyeing a national $1.7 trillion infrastructure pipeline to underpin demand for its now fully owned Boral group.

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The precious metal is delivering for miners and investors ...

The ASX has again opened in the green as it inches close to regaining ground lost in last week’s market wipe-out.

The leading index of the top 200 companies was up 0.6 per cent shortly after the open to 78.73.6 - up 47 points.

All sectors were in positive territory, led by utilities, real estate and IT, which all gained more than 1.3 per cent.

Commonwealth Bank was up just 0.4 per cent after reporting a 6 per cent slip in profit, meeting analyst expectations.

Evolution Mining rocketed 7.4 per cent after doubling its payout on a record profit result for 2023-24. Seven Group Holding was also feeling the love from investors, up 4 per cent on its impressive set of financials.

ASX Ltd was down 3 per cent after the corporate watchdog launched legal action over its bungled CHESS system. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has accused it of issuing misleading statements over the progress of the clearing system back in early 2022.

Seven West Media boss Jeff Howard says the company is working to build a better and more resilient business as it manages a tough advertising market.

The company on Wednesday reported increasing its share of revenue and audience growth had partly offset the impact of a depressed advertising sector amid broader cost-of-living pressures hitting consumers.

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Forecasters expect a monthly report on US consumer prices to show another modest increase last month, reinforcing widespread expectations for a Federal Reserve interest rate cut in September.

The figures, to be published overnight Wednesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, will probably show the consumer price index, and a “core” gauge excluding food and energy, both advanced 0.2 per cent in July, according to the median estimates in a Bloomberg survey.

Such a reading would mark the smallest three-month increase in core inflation since early 2021, just before the broad rollout of COVID-19 vaccines that spurred a reopening boom in the US economy.

“Bloomberg Economics expects July’s CPI to be soft, driven by a long-anticipated slowdown in housing rents, a decline in used-car prices, and discounts in discretionary services categories as consumers rein in spending,” chief US economist Anna Wong said in a preview of the numbers.

Bloomberg

Alphabet’s Google has unveiled a line-up of new Pixel smartphones with deeper integrations of its artificial intelligence technology.

The event at Alphabet’s Bay View campus in Mountain View, California, bucks a tradition Google has maintained with every iteration of Pixel — its flagship smartphone launched in October 2016 — to announce the new version in the northern hemisphere autumn.

The earlier timing is Google’s latest bid to keep up with rivals in injecting AI features into its consumer-facing products and comes ahead of Apple’s planned launch of a new iPhone in September.

New AI integrations announced overnight Tuesday include a Pixel-only feature that lets users search for information stored in screenshots.

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