Australia’s mining and energy exports are expected to have hit a record-high of more than $400 billion as the fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine deepens global shortages of coal and natural gas and sends commodity prices soaring. Federal government trade data to be released on Monday reveals a 26 per cent increase in export earnings in the past financial […]

video Supermarket sticker shock showing ‘positive signs’: Stew Leonard Stew Leonard’s president and CEO Stew Leonard says suppliers have started splitting rising transportation costs, and that the supply chain is ‘smoothing out.’ While new data from the Farm Bureau found that Americans could be paying up to 17% more for their favorite cookout items this Independence Day, one supermarket CEO […]

In April and May of 2020, it appeared that the COVID-19 pandemic would wreck the economy and that the effects could last for a very long time. That April, unemployment was at its highest since World War II. Gross domestic product in the second quarter of the year fell by 32.9%. The economy rebounded strongly, particularly last year. That has […]

Germany’s business sentiment worsened more than expected in June as the war in Ukraine, high inflation and supply chain disruptions triggered fears of recession, survey results from the ifo Institute showed on Friday. After rising for two months, the business confidence index dropped to 92.3 in June from 93.0 in the previous month. The index was forecast to fall marginally […]

Iron ore prices have tumbled over the past fortnight amid a glut of Chinese steel that hints at a failure of China’s attempts to stimulate an economy weakened by its zero tolerance approach to outbreaks of COVID-19. Two weeks ago iron ore was trading around $US145 a tonne. This week it has traded as low as $US111.35 a tonne, a […]

A report released by the Commerce Department on Thursday showed new residential construction in the U.S. plunged by much more than expected in the month of May. The Commerce Department said housing starts tumbled by 14.4 percent to an annual rate of 1.549 million in May after jumping by 5.5 percent to a revised rate of 1.810 million in April. […]

Even after central banks recognised they got their inflation calls wrong last year, they’ve continued to flub their policy guidance, threatening greater damage to their credibility, roiling markets and undermining the pandemic recovery. The Federal Reserve now hiked interest rates by 75 basis points overnight, just weeks after Chair Jerome Powell and his team repeatedly advertised a half percentage point […]

WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve on Wednesday intensified its drive to tame high inflation by raising its key interest rate by three-quarters of a point — its largest hike in nearly three decades — and signaling more large rate increases to come that would raise the risk of another recession. The move the Fed announced after its latest policy meeting […]

Russia’s central bank decided for another sharp interest rate reduction on Friday as policymakers shifted its priority to supporting economic growth after the ruble strength lowered inflation. The Board of Directors of Bank of Russia decided to cut the benchmark rate by 150 basis points to 9.50 percent, taking it back to the level seen before the war with Ukraine […]

Americans have moved from city to city frequently during the COVID-19 pandemic. There are several reasons. Among them is that some people want to leave the large expensive cities on the coasts, which include San Francisco and New York, for smaller cities inland. The ability to relocate has been helped by two trends. One is historically low mortgage rates. The […]