Inflation drops to 4.3pc in November, ASX finishes lower as investors look ahead to US inflation figures — as it happened

The local share market has finished lower, dragged in part by losses by its major miners and lithium producers, even as fresh economic data bolstered the case that interest rates have peaked domestically.

The benchmark S&P/ASX200 index on Wednesday finished down 0.7% to 7,468.5 points while the All Ordinaries dropped by 0.6% to 7,702.7.

The Australian dollar was buying 67.03 US cents, from 67.10 US cents at Tuesday's ASX close.

That's it for today's blog, but we'll be back to do it again tomorrow.

Until then, you can catch up on today's developments below, or download the ABC News app and subscribe to our range of news alerts for the latest news.

Good question, Chrisso.

I did some quick googling and found it for you: voila.

The Competition and Consumer (Industry Codes—Food and Grocery) Regulation 2015 as it's known, is a voluntary code under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010.

Basically, it sets out agreements around grocery pricing and other things with suppliers and wholesalers or retailers.

If you're not inspired to sift through pages of dense legislation, you can read all about the code and what it means on this handy page that breaks it down, thanks to the good people at the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Speaking of inflation and the cost of living, economist and former Labor minister (and occasional Skyhooks cover singer) Craig Emerson has spoken about the review on the grocery code of conduct he's been tasked to lead.

It's looking into the relationship between production costs and what consumers pay — and the idea is it will aim to bring prices down at the check-out.

Mr Emerson was asked if and how the review would actually do that on News Channel a little earlier.

The ABS has also released jobs data today which shows vacancies have fallen again — but only slightly this time.

There were 389,000 job vacancies in November 2023, down 3,000 from August.

Despite that, the employment market still hasn't recovered from the impacts of the pandemic, the ABS's David Taylor explains:

"Job vacancies remain well above their pre-COVID-19 pandemic level, around 71 per cent higher than February 2020."

It means almost 20% of businesses in Australia have jobs they can't fill.

Customer-facing industries like health care and accommodation are struggling the most to find workers.

Callam Pickering from global job site Indeed says it's an employee's market:

"Talent and skill shortages remain common, although strong population growth has helped ease the significant imbalance between labour demand and supply that emerged after the pandemic. Jobseekers still find themselves in a favourable position, with considerable control over where and how they work. It remains a good time to ask for higher wages or benefits or to switch employers."

So now might be a good time to ask for that pay rise.

The ASX is still slightly lower as we cruise into lunchtime, down 0.3% to 7,497 points as of 12:35pm AEDT.

(If you are chasing live figures, head to the top of the blog.)

Despite trading down, only three of the 11 sectors are in the red: basic materials (-1.7%), utilities (-0.8%) and consumer non-cyclicals (-0.1%).

Academic and educational services has gained the most (+1.5%), followed by healthcare (+0.8%), real estate (+0.5%), consumer cyclicals (+0.4%), technology (+0.2%) and energy (+0.1%).

Industrials and financials are both flat.

Looking at the top performers so far:

• Alumina +13.8%
• Paladin Energy +10.1%
• Boss Energy +5.6%
• Telix Pharmaceuticals +3.3%
• Healius +2.7%

And at the other end of the scale:

• IGO -6.2%
• Mineral Resources -4.6%
• Liontown Resources -4.1%
• Nickel Industries -3.8%
• Pilbara Minerals -3.8%

Even though inflation has dropped more than economists were expecting in November, it doesn't mean we can expect the RBA to start cutting interest rates any time soon.

Based on today's data, ANZ senior economist Catherine Birch believes interest rates have peaked at 4.35%, but she can't see any rate relief coming from the RBA until late 2024 "at least".

"The reason for this is that yes, things are slowing down but inflation, even at that 4.3% that we saw today, is still well above that 2 to 3% target band," she said.

"Yes, Inflation is a lagging indicator so it suggests it will continue to decline, but the RBA wants to make sure that it isn't declining and then suddenly plateaus above that 2 to 3% target band.

"They want to be really sure, and that is something that we are seeing overseas as well.

"For example in the US, the Fed are watching their inflation rate closely to make sure it actually gets back to their target and stays there.

"Because we have seen in past cycles inflation come down but then pick up again if rates are eased too quickly or aren't high enough.

"But we think at the moment, we are the right spot."

That's according to Catherine Birch, a senior economist from ANZ who spoke to my colleague David Chau on the ABC's News Channel a short time ago.

She says inflation declined "quite sharply" this month, and makes it quite challenging for the December quarterly inflation reading (which takes in inflation from October, November and December) to be larger than what the RBA is forecasting.

(Generally speaking, the RBA prefers these quarterly readings to their monthly counterparts, as they strip out volatile items.)

The RBA's current forecast of inflation is an increase of 1% for the December quarter — and Ms Birch says it'll be "quite difficult" for that quarterly reading to exceed that expectation.

"What that means is that the RBA wants to see inflation falling and it is not very tolerant of inflation not falling as quickly as it is forecast," she said.

"[But] because inflation has slowed, that suggests that we won't see a rate hike at their February meeting."

There's always more than meets the eye when it comes to inflation figures, so let's take a closer look at this 4.3% figure for the year to November.

The ABS notes that prices are still rising quite sharply, but they're a far cry from when they peaked at 8.4% in December 2022 — and today's figures show inflation is going in the right direction.

Housing, food and non-alcoholic beverages all saw price rises, as did insurance costs, alcohol and tobacco (the latter due to higher tobacco prices).

Prices fell over the past year for clothing and footwear (-0.9 per cent), furnishings, household equipment and services (-0.3 per cent), and holiday travel and accommodation (-0.3 per cent).

Unsurprisingly, rent also was higher given how tight vacancy rates are around the country, and electricity power prices also saw increases due to higher prices flowing through.

It's not all bad news though — fuel prices went down, thanks to global oil prices hitting a five-month low, and automotive fuel prices only went up by 2.3% in November, well below that 4.3% inflation rate we're seeing.

Overall, these numbers are much better than economists were expecting, and it certainly adds weight to the case that the RBA could be done with rate hikes.

Of course, we won't know for sure how the RBA feels about these figures until they meet early next month.

The latest official data shows inflation slowed to 4.3% over the year to November, down from 4.9% in the 12 months to October.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics says this is the slowest annual rate of price rises since January 2022.

Economists were generally expecting the Consumer Price Indicator to show price rises of 4.4% over the year to November.

You can read more from my colleague Michael Janda below:

As tipped by the futures market, the ASX has opened lower ahead of much-anticipated ABS inflation data for November.

Australia's benchmark ASX 200 stock index was down 0.4% in the first 50 minutes of trading.

Mining led the decline, with particularly large falls across the gold, nickel and lithium sectors, but also heavy declines for the big iron ore players BHP (-1.8%), Rio Tinto (-2.3%) and Fortescue (-1.8%).

The financial sector wasn't helping either, with the big four banks all 0.3-0.4% lower.

Utilities were also lower, although all other industry sectors were trading higher early on, led by healthcare and consumer cyclicals.

Uranium miner Paladin Energy and aluminum refiner Alumina Ltd were the standout gains on the local market, while mining companies dominated the biggest declines.

From Reuters:

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said on Tuesday that someone posted a fake message on its social media account on platform X, claiming that it had given the much-anticipated approval for spot bitcoin exchange traded funds (ETFs).

The regulator has not yet approved spot bitcoin ETFs, an SEC spokesperson said, adding that the agency's account had been compromised. The spokesperson did not provide additional details.

The unauthorized post on X, formerly known as Twitter, said that the SEC had granted approval for bitcoin ETFs on all registered national securities exchanges and included a picture purporting to quote SEC Chair Gary Gensler. The post was picked up by Reuters and other news media that monitor the SEC's account. The price of bitcoin jumped after the post.

The posting came as the SEC was widely expected on Wednesday to finally approve a batch of ETFs that track the price of bitcoin, in a potential watershed moment for the crypto industry.

The price of bitcoin shot up to around $US48,000 on the fake post, before falling to below $US45,000 minutes later. It was last down 3.15% at $US45,513 after the SEC deleted and disavowed the information. Some analysts had expected bitcoin to fall on the ETF approvals, after gaining more than 70% in recent months on the expectation of a greenlight.

Economist and former Labor minister Craig Emerson, perhaps most famous for his cringeworthy rewrite of a Skyhooks classic, has been appointed to lead a review of the grocery code of conduct.

If you don't get the Whyalla wipeout reference in the title of this post, watch this:

The grocery code of conduct governs the relationship between the big supermarkets and their suppliers, but there are concerns it isn't effective at leveling the power balance between the parties.

ABC political reporter Jake Evans has more.

The Fair Work Ombudsman has launched court actions against the operators of three United Petroleum outlets, and issued compliance notices to eight operators for staff underpayments, along with cautions to another five operators for record keeping deficiencies.

The FWO audited 20 United Petroleum sites as part of ongoing scrutiny into the company, whose franchisees and service station operators have been subject to a number of long-running claims of staff underpayment.

The compliance notices recovered $6,584 in underpayments for 20 workers, the FWO said in a press release.

Federal Circuit Court action has been taken against the operators of three United Petroleum outlets.

KLM Foods Pty Ltd and Mr Loveleen Gupta, operators of the Sandy Bay and Kingston United Petroleum outlets in Tasmania, along with the related company Vizaan which employed one of the allegedly affected staff members, are facing allegations by the FWO that they underpaid four migrant workers a total of more than $20,000 and issued false pay slips.

"The alleged underpayments for three of the workers were rectified after the FWO began investigating — however, it is alleged that KLM Foods and Mr Gupta also breached the Fair Work Act by requiring one of the workers to make an unlawful cashback payment of $6,353 to KLM Foods in June 2023," the FWO release stated.

The FWO also alleges KLM Foods provided false timesheets to the regulator.

"The alleged providing of false records is serious and unacceptable conduct," said Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth.

"Employers should be aware our experienced inspectors will test whether time and wages records are legitimate. If you use false records you will be found out."

The other Federal Circuit Court action is against the operator of the United Petroleum outlet in Queenstown, Adelaide, Sai Enterprises, and its manager Raman Monga.

The FWO alleges three workers were not paid a total of $2,668 in accrued but untaken annual leave entitlements at the conclusion of their employment with the firm. Two of the workers were international students.

The FWO also alleges Sai Enterprises breached workplace laws by failing to issue the workers with pay slips within one working day of making a payment and failing to have written agreements for part-time staff.

The FWO said the Queenstown outlet workers were back-paid in full after it started investigating.

The companies face penalties of up to $66,600 per contravention, and Mr Gupta and Mr Monga faces penalties of up to $13,320 per contravention (except for the alleged unlawful cashback contravention). KLM Foods Pty Ltd faces a penalty of up to $82,500 and Mr Gupta faces a penalty of up to $16,500 for the alleged unlawful cashback contravention.

The ABC's Ben Knight did an excellent story a couple of years ago looking at United Petroleum's treatment of its franchisees and the challenges they face to try and remain profitable.

• ASX 200 futures: -0.2% to 7,481 points
• Australian dollar: Flat at 66.9 US cents
• S&P 500: -0.1% to 4,757 points
• Nasdaq: +0.1% to 14,858 points
• FTSE: -0.1% to 7,684 points
• EuroStoxx: -0.2% to 477 points
• Spot gold: Flat at $US2,030/ounce
• Brent crude: +1.7% to $US77.42/barrel
• Bitcoin: +1.2% to $US45,950

Prices current around 9:20am AEDT.

Live updates on the major ASX indices:

The rising issue of fires sparked by lithium batteries in devices such as e-bikes and e-scooters has garnered a lot of attention.

So much so that a peak strata body is now advising body corporates to ban charging them indoors in apartments.

It suggests instead that they should be charged in safe common areas or on balconies.

ABC Radio Sydney's Rosemary Bolger examines the (im)practicalities of that approach.

As the modern pop icon prepares to grace out shores next month, RN Breakfast's Kimberley Price has taken a look at the big money she'll generate for the economies in Sydney and Melbourne, where she is performing.

"We actually think the total spend will be in the order of $136 million, or $135.8 million to be precise," Venues NSW chief executive Kerrie Mather told RN Breakfast.

"It'll be a very significant economic contributor to New South Wales."

Frontier Touring is responsible for bringing Taylor Swift to Australia and predicts 60,000 interstate visitors and 6,000 international visitors across the four concerts in Sydney.

There are also three concerts at the MCG to add to those numbers for the Australian leg of her Eras tour.

If you think those are big numbers, The Washington Post recently estimated the Eras tour would ultimately contribute $US5.7 billion ($8.3 billion) to the US economy.

For more on Swiftenomics, you can read Kimberley's piece here:

JP Morgan's emerging markets equity analysts — Pedro Martins Junior, Jainik Moody and Anindita Gandhi — predict fourth quarter earnings in emerging markets will be down 28% on last year in US dollar terms.

That's not been helped by a strong dollar and continued rise in global interest rates.

The fall in profitability is expected to be biggest in emerging market Asia, at 30%.

They warn that South Korea, Czechia, Chile and Poland are likely to see the biggest earnings declines, with Indonesia, Egypt, the UAE and Hungary outperforming.

By sector, communication services, financials and healthcare show the largest consensus 4Q23 annual earnings expansion, while information technology, industrials and energy are expected to see the weakest results.

As for the medium term outlook?

"The consensus EPS [earnings per share] growth range estimates for EM [emerging markets] are USD +13% to +17% for 2024 and USD+11% to +15% for 2025."

The big economic data out this week is the monthly Consumer Price Indicator from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

As with pretty much all ABS releases, it'll be out at 11:30am AEDT and I'll have a standalone story for you while Kate Ainsworth takes over blogging duties.

So, what are the experts expecting?

The median (or middle) economist forecast on Refinitiv is for consumer prices to have risen 4.4% over the year to November, down from 4.9% in the year to October.

That's what CBA's economists are forecasting, with the bank's Stephen Wu pointing out the key aspect that will be watched in today's data.

"Importantly, Wednesday's release will include an update on market services price inflation that was not available in October," he wrote in a preview of CPI.

"This will confirm the degree to which inflation remains a 'homegrown and demand driven' issue — to use RBA governor Michele Bullock's words back in November. We expect to see signs of disinflation in market services after the Q3 23 figure."

Don't get too excited, disinflation means smaller price rises, not price cuts.

But, if the market forecasts are accurate, the inflation numbers may provide further weight to the view that the RBA is finished hiking interest rates.

Although Westpac's Justin Smirk says other key numbers will be missing from the November data, meaning that the full December quarter CPI to be released near the end of this month will be far more important for the rates outlook.

"It is also important to note that many household goods are surveyed only in the first month of the quarter, including footwear and accessories, and as such they miss the increasingly significant Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales," he wrote.

These are the other things Smirk will be watching out for.

"As well as services prices (including meals out & takeaway food), November will provide a critical update for:

"Dwellings and rents (rents fell in October due to government subsidies).

"Electricity as the impact of government rebates fade.

"Fresh fruit & vegetables, as we struggle to get good data on this group."

Westpac's forecast is for consumer prices to have risen 4.5% over the year to November.

JP Morgan has lifted its price target on Resmed from $US160 to $US195, according to Reuters, based on research from the company that shows patients on GLP-1 obesity drugs are more, not less, likely to use its continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machines to treat sleep apnea.

Resmed's share price fell 17% in 2023 based on investor fears that GLP-1 drugs, such as Ozempic, might slash demand for its products but cutting obesity rates. Obesity is a key risk factor for sleep apnea.

However, Resmed says patients on GLP-1s are actually 10% more likely to use PAP therapy than those not on medication.

Resmed's CEO spoke at JP Morgan's annual healthcare conference around 2:15pm on Monday afternoon in San Francisco (US Pacific time).

The company's US-listed shares responded in New York overnight, gaining 3% to $US178.

The company's Australian listed shares had already jumped more than 5% yesterday from $25 to $26.41 on the conference presentation.

My colleague, ABC business editor Ian Verrender, recently wrote a highly interesting column on the effect that new generation anti-obesity drugs, such as Ozempic, may have on financial markets and the economy.