Christine ‌Lagarde is expected ‌to leave ‌the European Central Bank before ‌the ‌end ⁠of her ​eight-year term as president, the ⁠Financial Times ‌reports, citing ​a person ‌familiar with ​her thinking.

Reuters could ​not ​immediately ​verify ‌the report.

The ECB did not ‌immediately respond to ​Reuters’ request for comment.

Lagarde wanted to ​exit ​the ​bank before the ‌French presidential election in April 2027, the FT said.

Alcoa has been given the green light to clear more Australian forest after being fined for stripping land for bauxite mining without approvals.

The US aluminium giant has agreed to pay $55 million to restore the environment as part of an enforceable undertaking reached with the federal government on Wednesday.

It relates to habitat destruction in the Northern Jarrah Forest, south of Perth, between 2019 and 2025.

“It’s the largest conservation‑focused commitment of its kind,” Federal Environment Minister Murray Watt said as he spruiked the deal.

The company did not seek the appropriate legal approvals to clear the land under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.

The agreement, which is enforceable in the Federal Court, will deliver permanent ecological offsets to preserve important habitat.

It will also expand conservation programs for species, including Western Australia’s three black cockatoo species, and strengthen invasive‑species management within the Northern Jarrah Forest.

Senator Watt also granted Alcoa a national‑interest exemption to allow the company to continue land clearing for its mining operations for 18 months, while a strategic assessment is completed.

This will ensure the continued supply of bauxite for industry in Australia and with trade partners, he said.

It also ensures Alcoa can sustain its operations, which employ about 6000 workers.

The miner has committed to pay $4.2 million in additional offsets for activities covered by the exemption for management of the environmental impacts.

The federal environment department and Alcoa have agreed to develop a strategic assessment agreement to enable future environmental approvals.

This will guide sustainable mining at Alcoa’s Huntly and Willowdale mining operations, around 100km south of Perth, until 2045.

“This agreement will enable government to assess the cumulative environmental impacts of Alcoa’s local mining operations and provide strong protections for threatened species and ecological communities, while offering Alcoa long-term operational certainty,” Senator Watt said.

Alcoa said modernising the approvals framework will provide a better understanding of the potential impacts of land clearing and mining on significant flora and fauna into the future.

The company will continue to limit clearing to 800 hectares per year and increase new rehabilitation rates annually to 1,000 hectares per year by 2027.

“We are committed to responsible operations and welcome this important step in transitioning our approvals to a contemporary assessment process that provides increased certainty for our operations and our people into the future,” Alcoa president and chief executive William F Oplinger said.

The strategic assessment will not impact an ongoing accredited environmental assessment of the future Myara North and Holyoake mine regions of the Huntly mine under WA and federal environment law.

The Minerals Council of Australia said the agreement was a pragmatic decision by Alcoa and the federal government.

Chief executive Tania Constable called on state and federal governments to “rapidly finalise” workable national environmental standards and assessment agreements to reduce mine approval delays.

One of the Australian cohort of so-called “ISIS brides” and their children has been barred from entering the country while trying to flee Syria.

The group of 34 women and children had tried to leave the Al Roj refugee camp in Syria on Monday with the intention of trying to make it to the capital Damascus and then on to Australia.

They were sent back because of an administrative issue, but Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promised that the government would not offer the partners and children of Islamic State members repatriation aid.

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said one of the group had been assessed by security agencies as meeting a threshold to be banned from entering the country, despite being a citizen.

“I can confirm that one individual in this cohort has been issued a temporary exclusion order, which was made on advice from security agencies,” Mr Burke said in a statement on Wednesday.

“At this stage, security agencies have not provided advice that other members of the cohort meet the required legal thresholds for temporary exclusion orders.”

A temporary exclusion order stops Australian citizens from returning to the country from overseas for up to two years if they are deemed a security risk.

The opposition has for days been calling for the government to take the step.

Mr Albanese earlier said the government was taking national security advice about the cohort in Syria.

“We will implement the law to its fullest capacity that we can. We want to make sure that Australians are kept safe,” he told reporters in Tasmania.

“These are people who chose to go overseas to align themselves with an ideology which is the caliphate, which is a brutal, reactionary ideology and that seeks to undermine and destroy our way of life.

“We are providing no assistance to these people, and won’t provide any assistance to these people, but we won’t breach Australian law.”

A mayor is urging Pauline Hanson to visit his community during Ramadan after the senator claimed suburbs in the area are unsafe because of its Muslim population.

The One Nation leader has been widely condemned for comments in an interview on Monday, saying there were “no good Muslims”.

In a subsequent interview on Wednesday, where she walked back parts of the remarks but also rejected criticism of it, she said suburbs such as Lakemba in western Sydney were unsafe because of its Islamic residents.

“It concerns me greatly that people can’t go into certain suburbs in this country now … they don’t want to go into certain suburbs and I’ve been there to Lakemba, you feel unwelcome,” she told ABC TV.

Canterbury Bankstown Council mayor Bilal El-Hayek, who represents the area that takes in Lakemba, said Senator Hanson’s comments were divisive at a time when unity was needed in the community.

“Lakemba is no different to any other suburb or shopping precinct and there is no crime issue at Lakemba,” he told Sydney radio station 2GB.

“This has to stop, it really has to stop, because we need to come together at a time when the country is hurting.”

The most recent census showed 61 per cent of Lakemba residents were Islamic, with the suburb hosting popular food markets at night for Ramadan.

Mr El-Hayek said he had invited Senator Hanson to attend the markets, which begin on Thursday.

“We receive over one million people, the majority are actually not of the Islamic faith,” he said.

“At the moment when we need to come together, it’s a shame to see people playing politics.”

When pressed about her comments on Wednesday, the Queensland senator backtracked on her remarks about there being no good Muslims.

“No, I don’t genuinely believe that,” she told ABC TV, adding a non-practising Muslim woman had run for election for One Nation.

“If I’ve offended anyone out there that doesn’t believe in Sharia law or multiple marriages or wants to bring ISIS brides in or people from Gaza who believes in the caliphate… then I apologise to you for my comment.

“But in general, that’s what they want: a world caliphate and I’m not going to apologise.”

Race discrimination commissioner Giridharan Sivaraman joined calls for the senator to apologise.

“Public figures have a responsibility to elevate our national conversation, not inflame tensions, divide us or undermine the dignity of others,” he said.

Australian National Imams Council president Shadi Alsuleiman strongly rejected the firebrand senator’s prior comments, saying they reflected a serious misunderstanding of Islam and the Muslim community.

“For many years, she has made inaccurate and harmful statements based on misinformation rather than genuine engagement,” he told AAP.

Senator Hanson dismissed the criticism from Islamic groups.

“Of course they’re going to say that, but I’ve heard more hateful things coming out of the mouths of imams giving their sermons on the streets of Sydney, and other places in Australia, but nothing’s been said about that,” she said.

Senator Hanson used her maiden speech to the Senate in 2016 to claim Australia was being “swamped by Muslims”, a repeat of her 1996 speech to parliament’s lower house about Australia “being swamped by Asians”.

More recently, she drew widespread condemnation when she wore a burqa in the senate.

One Nation has been out-performing the coalition in recent surveys, with the latest Newspoll showing the party gaining a 27 per cent primary vote compared to the opposition’s 18 per cent.

Top coffee-growing countries are sweltering through more than 50 extra days a year of temperatures hot enough to harm the beloved plants responsible for the morning brew.

Research from Climate Central suggests human-caused climate change is contributing to higher latte prices worldwide, including coffee-obsessed Australia. 

“Bean belt” countries responsible for 75 per cent of global supply – Brazil, Vietnam, Colombia, Ethiopia, and Indonesia – experienced an average of 57 extra days of coffee-harming heat than would have been expected without climate change.

The two dominant coffee plants – arabica and robusta – are both vulnerable to extreme heat, with temperatures above 30C considered extremely harmful for the former and suboptimal for the latter.

In high temperatures, crops come under stress that can reduce yield, bean quality and leave plants more disease-prone.

Climate Central vice president for science Kristina Dahl said nearly every coffee region was experiencing extra days of extreme heat.

“Climate change is coming for our coffee,” Dr Dahl said. 

“In time, these impacts may ripple outward from farms to consumers, right into the quality and cost of your daily brew.”

Drought in Brazil has already been weighing on bean supply and feeding into higher wholesale prices.

Arabica and robusta coffee bean prices almost doubled from 2023 to 2025, according to International Coffee Organisation figures, with prices reaching an all-time high in February 2025.

Higher prices for raw beans translates into a more expensive cup of coffee in Australia, though the final price tag also captures wages, rent, energy and other costs that businesses say have also been elevated.

Nationwide, the cost of an average flat white rose about 10 per cent between 2023 and 2025, according to Square’s digital payments numbers retrieved from cafes.

As well as fuelling coffee-harming heat, climate change can also alter rainfall patterns and make pest and disease management more challenging. 

Global warming has been linked to the spread of one of the crop’s most notorious pests – the coffee berry borer – into higher-altitude areas.

Coffee farmers, who are predominantly small-scale operators, do have methods available to them to adapt to rising temperatures and changing rainfall patterns.

But the Climate Central analysis says small-time farmers are receiving just a fraction of the finance they needed to adapt to climate change.

Producers such as Chief Rafael Mopimop Suru have been embracing sustainable coffee-farming methods with success.

The farm on Sete de Setembro Indigenous Land in Rondonia, Brazil, leverages agroforestry – planting crops and livestock alongside tree – to produce its Amazonian robusta coffee.

Planting trees with the crops helps shade them from extreme heat and rain, and also produces leaf litter that fertilises the soil and locks in moisture.

The agroforestry operation has received little in the way of finance for climate adaptation.

“We have never been able to access rural credit,” Mr Mopimop Suru said.

“It’s a lot of bureaucracy, they arrive here without understanding our reality, they talk and then leave.”

Millions of Australians’ budgets will take another hit with the biggest rise in health insurance costs in years, but most are expected to still hang onto their policies.

An average premium increase of 4.41 per cent was approved by Health Minister Mark Butler on Tuesday, which experts say could trigger many policyholders to look at downgrading their cover to save money.

The increase will kick in from April 1 and is up from a 3.73 per cent price rise the year before.

It’s the largest single-year rise in premiums since 2017, when they rose by 4.84 per cent.

Health economist Stephen Duckett said inflation and the steady use of private hospital services were driving up premiums.

“Prices are going up everywhere, so there’s no surprise they’re also going up in the health sector,” he told AAP.

Many people would drop their levels of cover as a result of the increase, Mr Duckett said.

“But the people expecting to use hospital services will stay to the bitter end with their health insurance,” he said.

Finder personal finance expert Sarah Megginson said the increase was another blow to families off the back of an interest rate hike and the federal energy rebate finishing at the end of 2025.

“It just feels like there’s pressure coming from any corner,” she said.

The impacts of cancelling or downgrading insurance could be dire if people weren’t advised properly, Ms Megginson said.

“My father-in-law was with a major health insurer for decades and downgraded his premium as it was getting too expensive,” she said.

“He then had a really significant heart issue and he wasn’t covered for it. The bill was going to be over $25,000.”

About one-in-seven people indicated they wouldn’t be renewing their health insurance premiums in 2026, according to the financial comparison website’s research.

The federal health minister said the rise in premiums reflected a rising cost for medical and hospital services, which rose five per cent in 2025.

“The government understands the pressure health insurance premium changes put on Australians and decisions about private health insurance premiums must put consumers first,” he said.

Private Healthcare Australia chief executive Rachel David said health funds were working to balance the affordability of insurance with the rising costs of providing care.

“More people are using their health insurance for high-cost hospital care such as joint replacements and cancer treatment, and the cost of delivering care continues to rise,” Dr David said.

“If health funds could keep premiums the same without jeopardising their ability to pay claims, they would.”

It’s estimated more than 15 million people have private health insurance in Australia.

Mr Butler said he rejected previous requests by private health insurance companies for larger increases, but called for the firms to do right by their customers.

“I expect private health insurers and hospitals to work hard to bring down costs and keep future price increases to a minimum,” he said.

Destructive hailstorms and thunderstorms resulted in tens of thousands of insurance claims for one of the nation’s biggest insurers, denting its interim earnings.

Suncorp paid out $542 million in claims from one storm alone, a November 25 thunderstorm that damaged vehicles and property across southeastern Australia.

That storm, which belted southeast Queensland with baseball-sized hail measuring 9cm in diameter, is likely to be one of the costliest in Suncorp’s recent history.

Thunderstorms struck eastern Australia and New Zealand on October 25, resulting in Suncorp having to pay out $358 million in claims.

Overall, Suncorp received 71,000 natural hazard claims during the half year to December.

Suncorp paid out $1.3 billion in total, which was $453 million above its natural hazard allowance.

Most of the damage involved hail, with 26,400 hail-related claims totalling $708 million in damages.

“This has been a challenging half, for the entire insurance industry, with the extreme weather events,” Suncorp CEO Steve Johnston said on Wednesday.

Suncorp is supporting customers impacted by the severe weather events and continues to finalise earlier complex claims, including from ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred and flooding in Queensland and NSW.

Chief financial officer Jeremy Robson said the hail events were “relatively random in terms of weather patterns” and there was a less-than-clear connection to climate change dynamics.

Suncorp on Wednesday reported a 76 per cent fall in net profit for the first half of 2025/26 to $263 million, from $1.1 billion a year ago.

Cash earnings also dropped sharply, to $270 million from $828 million.

Suncorp collected $7.69 billion in gross written premiums, up 2.7 per cent from a year ago in the six months ended December 30.

The company noted it used 15 different AI chatbots to handle more than 1.6 million digital customer interactions in the half, up more than 28 per cent.

Shares in Suncorp, which declared a first-half dividend of 17 cents, fell more than four per cent to $15.33 in lunchtime trading on Wednesday.

One of Australia’s biggest apartment and residential communities suppliers has recorded strong growth in home sales as debate rages across the nation about access to ownership.

Mirvac on Wednesday reported a five per cent rise in net operating profit to $248 million in the first half of 2025/26, from the same period last year.

The result came after residential property sales jumped 38 per cent, with more than a thousand lots exchanged, of which 835 were settled, representing a boost of 22 per cent.

Given the new, rising interest rates environment, Mirvac CEO Campbell Hanan said home seeker inquiry levels in January and February were similar to December, as the group heads toward the end of its first half.

“I can’t stress enough, there is a chronic undersupply of housing in Australia and that chronic undersupply is going to be there for a while,” Mr Hanan told analysts during a briefing.

“There is a lot of pent-up demand that is looking to find a solution to this housing problem.”

One rate hike by the central bank in February may not be enough to move the needle on slower demand, Mr Hanna noted, pointing to a recent sold-out land release for a residential community in Perth’s Bullsbrook.

Mirvac CEO of development Stuart Penklis said customer sentiment around interest rates going up was happening in September and October.

“We’ve seen continued momentum across our projects, particularly from a leads (or inquiries) perspective,” he said.

“Leads are the strongest they’ve been in four years in the December quarter and that has continued into January and February.”

Mr Penklis noted Mirvac’s portfolio was not reliant just on first home buyers, but on upgraders and right-sizers, particularly in the middle ring of its target capital cities and NSW.

Pre-sales have been heavily skewed at 69 per cent to upgraders and right-sizers, followed by 19 per cent to investors, and seven per cent to first home buyers.

It’s currently looking to build 800 apartments on the site of the old Sydney Fish Market in Blackwattle Bay, with first settlements targeted for 2030.

In Karnup, about 51km from the Perth CBD, it’s building 1500 new homes in partnership with the West Australian government.

Mr Penklis said the semi-rural area was one of the fastest-growing catchments in Australia.

“The underlying (housing) market fundamentals remain supportive, including strong population growth, continued undersupply, resilient house prices and rental growth expectations,” he said.

“We remain uniquely positioned across the full residential spectrum – growth corridors, middle and inner rings – with the capability to deliver land built-form housing and apartments.”

Mirvac performed well across all its businesses, which include property development, ownership and management in the major cities of Sydney, Melbourne and Perth, Mr Hanan said.

Its portfolio comprises residential communities, office buildings, industrial assets, retail centres and build-to-rent projects.

Mirvac will pay investors a half-year distribution of 4.7 cents per stapled security.

Its securities jumped almost 5.5 per cent to $2.04 in morning trading.

Australia’s biggest lottery operator says it’s had a resilient first half despite it being the least-favourable period for winning jackpots in about four years.

The Lottery Corp, which runs the Powerball and Oz Lotto draws and Keno games, booked a bottom-line first-half net profit of $173.3 million, down 1.4 per cent.

Revenue for the period grew by two per cent on the equivalent half to $1.8 billion, as earnings before interest and tax dipped one per cent to $313 million.

But the performance showed resilience, despite a $400 million unfavourable impact on turnover during “the least favourable half year for jackpot outcomes” since its demerger from gaming group Tabcorp in 2022.

Around half of the group’s turnover came from jackpot games, chief financial officer Adam Newman said.

“There is going to always be a period of volatility, depending upon where those balls come out of the barrel,” he told analysts during an earnings briefing.

“I don’t think we can get away from that.”

Despite the lack of jackpots, it was a strong underlying performance, according to The Lott’s CEO Wayne Pickup.

Its lotteries division posted a 2.8 per fall in underlying earnings to $269.3 million, as the value of its Powerball and OzLotto jackpots declined by 14.2 per cent.

“Growth in the base game portfolio largely offset reduced jackpot games volumes,” Mr Pickup told shareholders.

But The Lott also noted its new $6 million division 1 offer and subscription price increase for Saturday Lotto draws, implemented in May, “won immediate acceptance” with strong price retention.

A similar price increase was made for Powerball in November, and further hikes remained on the table.

“It’s something that the business has done extremely well over time, and it will certainly continue to be one of our levers, but not the only lever that we looked at,” Mr Pickup said.

“And as you probably know with these lottery products, that price increase correlates through to bigger jackpots, bigger prizes, so that there’s an immediate upside for customers, for our retail partners, as well through commissions.”

Set for Life will be The Lott’s next game refresh, with additional upfront prizes for divisions 1 and 2, coupled with a pricier subscription.

The Lott’s popular Keno arm continued to grow, with a 11.8 per cent rise in underlying earnings to $43.7 million.

Lottery Corp will pay an interim dividend of eight cents for the half year ended December 31, in line with the previous corresponding period.

Looking ahead, the company remains focused on its strategy, which includes evolving as a digital entertainment company, concentrating on Australia’s heavily regulated market and making technology investments.

“Ultimately, we want customers to choose us for entertainment, not just for big jackpots,” Mr Pickup said.

“Technology enables personalised experiences at scale, that’s what keeps customers coming back and engaged.”

The stock market responded positively to the results, sending The Lott’s share price five per cent higher to $5.42 in morning trading.

Five years after Warren Buffett sold off all of Berkshire Hathaway’s newspapers and predicted unending declines for most of the industry, Berkshire disclosed a new $US350 million ($A496 million) investment in the New York Times.

The somewhat surprising move highlighted the quarterly update Berkshire filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission about the company’s stock holdings in Buffett’s last quarter as CEO. 

Berkshire also increased its investment in Chevron just before President Donald Trump ordered the arrest of Venezuela’s president, and the Omaha-based company continued selling off more of its Bank of America and Apple shares.

 At the time that Buffett sold off Berkshire’s dozens of newspapers in 2020 he concluded the industry was “toast”.

But even then he suggested that newspapers with a national brand like the Times or Wall Street Journal might still do well. 

“It’s a full circle moment for Berkshire Hathaway in reinvesting in news and a huge vote of confidence by Berkshire in the business strategy of the New York Times,” said Tim Franklin, a professor and chair of local news at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. 

Franklin said the Times may have its roots in the newspaper business, but today it’s a thriving digital business with popular games like Wordle, a well known sports platform called The Athletic and more than 12 million digital subscribers. 

He said maybe struggling local newspapers can draw some lessons from the “digital news powerhouse” the Times has become and find ways to offer online games and showcase the local sports coverage that readers can’t get elsewhere.

These quarterly stock portfolio filings don’t make clear whether Buffett made every move or whether one of Berkshire’s other investment managers did.

Buffett generally handled any investments worth more than $US1 billion ($A1.4 billion), so at the size of this Times investment it’s not certain whether this was one of his bets. 

But many investors will still try to copy it because of Buffett’s remarkable track record over the decades before he handed the CEO title over to Greg Abel in January after six decades of leading Berkshire. Shares of the Times jumped nearly three per cent in after hours trading after Berkshire disclosed the stake.