Fast Five | 10 Sep 2026

0:00Booking a verbo vacation rental means you get Verbo care in 24-7 life support, verified reviews from real guests and top rated homes with the love by guest filter. I just booked my Verbo because there was a sweet line for it. We all have our reasons. If you know, give Verbo. Terms apply. See Verbo.com slash trust for details. It's Thursday, the 10th of September, 2026. Welcome to the Fast Five Business News. By fear and greed, we'll be giving you the top five business stories you need to know in just five minutes. I'm Michael Thompson and good morning, Sean Almer. Good morning, Michael. All right, let's get going. Five stories, five minutes. Story number one, the prices of the most expensive homes in the bigger cities across the country have fallen most with upper quartile dwellings in both Sydney and Melbourne down more than 10%. The bad news for sellers of expensive homes comes as the deputy reserve bank governor reels rates the potential for one or two rate hikes. This year, a new report from research group Cotality shows that top end homes have tumbled in value. But lower end dwellings have actually held up reasonably well.

1:01Top end Sydney hires are off 10.7% from their peak, Melbourne 10.5%. Compare that to the 12 month figure for the broader economy. That's actually less than 3%. Selling an expensive house in Sydney or Melbourne is now very tough. The Cotality report says that in recent months, pretty much all capital city markets have started to drop. In cities like Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, much less difference between the expensive homes and the less expensive homes. Now, one thing that sure won't help house prices much higher interest rates market economists are converging on the view that interest rates will rise at least one maybe two more times this year. The first one potentially in three weeks time stronger than expected growth figures last week ongoing inflationary pressures and comments on Tuesday night from RBA deputy governor Andrew Houser have convinced many economists that rates are again on the rise. Houser was very frank for a central banker, the toll ABC 730 report. I'll quote him, inflation is too high and that's why we raised interest rates three times at the beginning of this year.

2:05The question now, frankly, for us, is have we done enough or is more needed? End quote. All four big banks are now forecasting a rate hike as are an increasing number of big bank economists. All right, moving on now, Sean to story number two crude oil prices jumped to nearly 100 US dollars a barrel after the US launch strikes on Iranian oil tankers and who's he militants hit Saudi Arabian energy infrastructure in a new escalation really in the Middle East conflict. US forces using the central command's words destroyed five Iranian crude oil tankers in retaliation for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps targeting an American warship with ballistic missiles twice over the past couple of days. Crude prices rose following the US strikes oils rallied since late August as the US Iran have repeatedly exchanged fire so much for the peace deal. Brent reached 126 bucks in April went back to 70 bucks in July now back around that 100 US dollar a barrel mark people often talk about a perfect storm of events.

3:10So if you put stories one and two together today, we've got inflation, hot lower economic growth, house prices falling, cost of living precious right pressures rising thanks to oil prices could be a rough few months for houses and businesses. Yeah, it does sound a little bit like that, Sean. At story number three today, the founder, bit of a change of pace really founder of surf and street wear brand gander clothing guy Rudd has bought more than 6% of KMD brands the somewhat struggling owner of Rick curl and cat man do among others. Yes, KMD has not been having a good time of it at share prices halved this year even after a couple of bidders have tried to buy different parts of the business. Rudd's business called new gravel spent more than 4.4 million dollars buying shares in KMD now has own 6.14% of it. privately owned gander was founded by Rudd a former lifesaver in 2003 in Torquin Victoria actually coincidentally rip cool also founded in Torquin Victoria back in 1969.

4:13Rudd began selling his garments at local markets grew the business to a nationwide operation with more than 100 stores. story number four apple is launching foldable iphone duo which is pretty cool. It's a price it's priced at around 2000 US dollars at an event which also features the iPhone 18 pro new apple watches updated air pods basically devices galore the centerpiece of the event overnight those the foldable smartphone. that apple hopes will be both a status symbol right if you really care about that kind of thing and but also something that will help restore its reputation as an innovator. Yes, a foldable phones haven't traditionally sold well few drawbacks short of battery life, fear cameras the crease people don't like that apples hoping this will turn it all around the events an important one for new CEO John turnus it's his first big launch a C.A. since taking over from Tim Cook on one September huge shoes to fill. Cook apple share price jumped 23 hundred percent under Tim Cook pretty phenomenal.

5:16Last one story number five spare a thought for all the mathematicians out there that have been toiling away on one of the unsolvable problems of maths. Because open AI says that it's newest artificial intelligence technology is solved one of the millennium problems which is this collection of important unanswered math questions meant to push the world's leading mathematicians to new heights the company announced that one of its latest models not yet actually released to the public. Needed just 88 hours to solve what mathematicians call the Navier Stokes existence and smoothness problem yes so the problem involves a series of equations that are often used to predict the weather according to New York Times I eyes fundamentally changing the upper reaches of mathematics which have long been viewed as a pinnacle of human achievement over the past year I systems successfully solved a wide range of problems that really have been unsolvable for decades. But these problems were not as complex or as closely watched as one that open AI technology has solved in the past couple of days phenomenal what is going on in that sector.

6:25Yes certainly yes all right there we go the top five business stories in five minutes thank you very much Sean thank you Michael it is Thursday the 10th of September 2026 make sure you're following the podcast and if you want something a little bit longer if this isn't enough business news for you can find our longer daily show called fear and greed. Where ever you listen to podcasts are Mark Thompson and that was the fast five business news by fear and great great day.