We are fast approaching the holiday season, with T-minus 32 days until Christmas. Cafes and restaurants in Sydney, at least, are packed like sardines, with merry (read: drunken) revellers pouring into the streets at all hours of the day and night. Likely because everyone is busy celebrating, markets have done very little over the last week. The ASX 200 has lifted 1.2%, while the S&P 500 has pushed 0.6% higher. Initially, the US bourse was weighed down by the tech giants, like Nvidia, but investors soon started buying the dip. It seems not even disappointing guidance can dissuade investors.
That said, long-time vaccine sceptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr's appointment to lead the US Health Department saw the ASX's healthcare sector fall around 2%. CSL's share price has fallen 2.5% over the last few days, with the news dragging Australia's biggest healthcare company to seven-month lows.
Bitcoin, however, has had a fantastic week - the digital coin lifted around 7.6% over the last five days - and is up more than 46% since Trump took out the US presidency in early November. Over the past year, the price of Bitcoin has soared 176%... So, for my Secret Santa out there, I will graciously accept Bitcoin for Christmas, my details are [redacted].
Australian house prices have soared 17x since 1981. Where will they go in 2025?
2024 in the Australian property market will go down as one of the less exciting years, according to Andrew Schwartz of Qualitas. But 2025, Schwartz says, is looking far more interesting, exciting, and even, thrilling. In this episode of The Rules of Investing, Livewire's Hans Lee sits down with Schwartz to discuss his views on where property prices will go next year, when he thinks the Reserve Bank will start to cut interest rates, and the real cost of achieving Australia's home building targets. Plus, Schwartz will argue why residential property is truly the best store of value (and wealth) out there.
Why Anthony Aboud isn’t shorting the Big Four Banks
Almost all of the investment world is negative on the Big Four Banks, but Perpetual’s Anthony Aboud is not shorting them. The banks fail to meet his criteria for shorting; “There are a lot of expensive companies. Valuation shorts in isolation have never really worked terribly well, you need to have something else”, Aboud says. He also points to the high quality of the banks, the slight earnings upgrades in a tough environment, and his view that “the operating environment is pretty good for the next 12-18 months”. In the following Views From the Top, Aboud shares the 7 red flags he looks for in a short position, as well where he is finding buying opportunities on the ASX.
This week’s interesting insight comes from the quarterly Janus Henderson Global Dividend Index. Total payouts hit a new record of US$431 billion, but this figure masks the fact that it was a measly 3% year-over-year rise. In Australia, one in seven Australian companies in our index cut their dividend payouts.
Last quarter, Commonwealth Bank was the sixth-largest dividend payer in the world. Rio Tinto came in 12th while Fortescue and the National Australia Bank came in 19th and 20th respectively.
But look closely at this table. Six of the top 10 on this list for Q3 2024 are from China. This includes #1, #2, #3 and even Alibaba at #5. All hail the new dividend capital of the world… China?
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