We’re moving

  After more than a year and 340 posts I pleased to announce that the Lighthouse Securities Blog is moving, well closing really. As you know I am a writer over at MacroBusiness which is clearly Australia’s leading finance, investment and economics blog. Macro Business is evolving and yesterday we released the first edition of our […]

Does the inverse Aussie curve spell recession?

Wives tales and Murphy’s Law persist for a reason. As I’m oft heard saying “Murphy’s Law wouldn’t be a law if it wasn’t true” So there are “market laws” as well. Old axioms that have persisted through time largely because of a good track record and predictive ability. One of these market laws is that […]

On the RBA, GDP and the Australian Dollar

I haven’t posted much this week as I have been busy so please don’t think I’ve been dodging my recession call in the wake of yesterday’s stellar GDP release. I’m about to hit the road so here are some quick thoughts. On the current market bounce: The markets good too bearish, priced too much in […]

Budget 2012 – Pass or Fail?

When you run a big business like Australia you need to take  account of many all your stakeholders and you make choices. That’s what Labour has done last night – they have favoured their political constituency at home over the wealthier. They have played to the international audience by delivering a surplus HEADLINE – this keeps […]

Australians aren’t whinging about the economy – they are reflecting their reality

I have long been advocating that there is a disconnect between policy makers and the media and what is happening in the real Australian economy in this GFC influenced world. I’m neither the first nor the last but as we head toward and Australian Austerity style Federal Budget and I hear people trotting out the […]

Australian Recession coming?

Two things happened yesterday that suggest to me that the Australian economy could be headed for recession. The first was the collapse of the First Fleet trucking company and the second was the release of the Australian Industry Group’s Performance of Service Index (PSI) which slumped 7.4 points. Houses and Holes covered it well in […]

China is not a one way bet for Australia

By Gregory McKenna, Cross posted with MacroBusiness At MacroBusiness we have been warning about the Australian policymaker love affair with all things Chinese for some time now. It’s not because we are natural contrarians but rather because we see risks in an over indulgence on any one economic theory or belief, be that overly optimistic (perma-bull) or […]

Confidence Slips all over the economy – mining will save us? Hardly!

Rightyo…time to get on my high horse again about the Australian economy and what is not being done by policy makers and the RBA. I live in the Hunter, I worked up until recently as the Treasurer of the dominant Financial Institution in the region, I spend and have spent countless hours, days and weeks getting to know and […]

Housing finance falters

Reblogged from puntersperspective: The Australian Bureau of Statistics released the latest housing finance figures today and they were disappointing however not unexpectedly so. Australia’s housing finance figures had steadily improved over the second half of 2011 which led some to call a turnaround in the housing market which had been under pressure for some time. These […]

School Shoes

In the earlier part of last year I mentioned to Greg that I thought the RBA was going to cut even though all the press at the time and the pundits were still talking, aggressively, about rate hikes. I’d seen on the ABC news that the talk was all about the need to hike but […]