A change of leader for the Liberals will do little to reverse the party’s electoral woes, a leading pollster warns.

Sussan Ley’s leadership has come under fire following her party’s split with the Nationals.

But the Liberals face an existential crisis regardless of who the opposition leader is, Redbridge director and former Liberal strategist Tony Barry says.

“No single personality is going to change around their fortunes at the moment,” he told AAP.

“They are polling around 20 per cent and they need to be around 45 per cent primary vote.

“They’re not even in the car park of the ballpark at the moment.

“The only way a reformed coalition will ever be competitive again is if they change the story arc and refocus on the economy and being bold with economic reform.”

While it is possible Ms Ley could face a leadership challenge when parliament resumes on Tuesday, she is likely to hold on for the time being after West Australian MP Andrew Hastie said he would not contest the top job.

Mr Hastie released a statement on Friday afternoon saying he did not have the numbers to mount a challenge to Ms Ley.

His expected leadership rival, frontbencher Angus Taylor, has not stated whether he plans to challenge.

Mr Barry said a change of approach was needed from the Liberals if they wanted to be competitive with Labor.

“The Liberal Party has become National Party-lite, and because they’ve got those rural characteristics, it simply doesn’t work in the urban vote centres,” he said.

“They need to double (their vote). They’re only going to do that by pitching their message on an economic narrative that differentiates them, differentiates them from Labor.”

The Liberals’ split from the Nationals has also complicated leadership tensions.

Nationals leader David Littleproud is facing a spill motion from Queensland MP Colin Boyce on Monday but it is unlikely to succeed.

Negotiations on reforming the coalition have been put on hold until the leadership spill takes place.

Ms Ley has named an interim shadow cabinet, giving the Nationals one week to come back to the negotiating table before a more permanent shadow ministry is locked in.

Mr Barry said the parties needed to put aside differences for the good of the Liberals and Nationals.

“They need to realise that being in a partnership means making internal trade-offs,” he said.

“It means accepting that you can’t remain in a coalition only for as long as it suits you, and then threaten to break it up on an issue that doesn’t suit you.

“They’ve got to be very mindful that their internal dysfunctions will just keep on accumulating scar tissue to the point where they’ll never recover.

“You can’t keep on accumulating scar tissue like this and think that there’s no enduring damage to your brand.”

State and territory leaders have agreed to help rein in the costs of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, but a key early intervention program has been delayed by several months.

National cabinet agreed to limit annual growth of the NDIS to six per cent per year, in exchange for securing an extra $25 billion for public hospital funding over the next five years from the Commonwealth.

However, a program to move children with mild to moderate levels of autism off the NDIS and into state-based programs has been delayed by several months to give jurisdictions more time to adjust to changes.

The $2 billion Thriving Kids program was due to begin in July, but will now begin from October.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Thriving Kids would be fully implemented by the start of 2028.

“The states put to us the possibility of a short delay in the full implementation of Thriving Kids,” he said in Sydney on Friday.

“We agreed that proposal was reasonable, that we get this right, and so, it is a positive move.”

State leaders had previously said they were blindsided by NDIS Minister Mark Butler’s announcement of the Thriving Kids scheme in 2025 during a speech at the National Press Club.

Opposition health spokeswoman Anne Ruston said the delay to Thriving Kids was concerning.

“Young Australians living with a disability and their families remain in ongoing uncertainty due to the complete lack of clarity and detail around the new Thriving Kids program,” she said.

ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr said jurisdictions would increase their share of contributions for the NDIS over the next five years.

“Two billion dollars will be matched to deliver Thriving Kids as the first phase of foundational supports, with the Commonwealth providing $1.4 billion of its contribution to support states,” he said.

“The ACT, along with all jurisdictions, is committed to improving the health outcomes for all Australians and putting the NDIS on a sustainable pathway.”

US President Donald Trump has chosen former Federal Reserve governor Kevin Warsh to head the US central bank when Jerome Powell’s leadership term ends in May, giving a frequent Fed critic a chance to put his idea ‍of monetary policy “regime change” into practise.

“I have known Kevin for a long period of time, and have no doubt that he will go down as one of ​the GREAT Fed Chairmen, maybe the best. On top of everything else, he is ‘central casting, and he will never let you down,” Trump said in announcing his latest move to put his stamp on a Fed he persistently criticises for not cutting interest rates quickly enough.

US stock index futures pared declines after Trump’s announced pick of Warsh, who markets perceive as someone who would support lower rates but who would stop well short of the more aggressive easing associated with some of the other potential nominees.

Trump announced the nomination, which requires confirmation by the US Senate, in a post on social media. 

The Fed has long been seen as a stabilising force in global financial markets due in part to its perceived independence from politics. 

Trump’s escalating efforts to test that independence, including his Justice Department’s decision earlier this month to open a criminal probe into Powell, have set the stage for a challenging Senate confirmation process for any successor.

Republican US Senator Thom Tillis has said he ‌will not support any of Trump’s ​Fed nominees amid the ongoing probe while fellow Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski has called for an investigation into the department’s actions. 

It has also opened the door to the possibility that Powell, who called the criminal probe a ‍pretext to pressure the Fed into setting monetary policy as the president wishes, may opt to stay on at the Fed as a governor even after his term as central bank chief is up in a bid to safeguard it from political capture.

The nomination caps a months-long process as Warsh, White House economic advisor Kevin Hassett and other top contenders – including sitting Fed governor Christopher Waller and Wall Street insider Rick Rieder – appeared regularly on TV to showcase their thoughts about the economy.

Trump has also tried to force out Fed ​governor Lisa Cook in a battle now before the Supreme Court that, if successful, would mark the first time a president has ever fired a ‌US central bank policymaker.

While Warsh is no White House insider, he has been a confidant of the president and a guest at the president’s Florida estate, and looks poised to push many of Trump’s priorities as a “shadow” Fed chief until Powell’s tenure in the top job ​ends in mid-May. 

A lawyer and distinguished visiting fellow in economics at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, Warsh has said he believes the president is right to press the central bank for steep rate cuts, and has criticised the Fed for underestimating the inflation-busting potential of ‍productivity growth supercharged by artificial intelligence.

Warsh, 55, was nearly named to the job in Trump’s first term before being passed over for Powell, and since then has kept a steady public profile through speeches and essays that have taken Powell and his colleagues to task for their management of the Fed’s balance sheet, interest rates and other actions.

He now will ​be ​responsible for an institution he has said should scale back its footprint in the economy and change the way ​it manages monetary policy. 

After studying law, Warsh worked for several years at Morgan Stanley where he dealt with mergers and acquisitions.

In 2002, he moved into politics, working under then president George W Bush, advising him on issues related to capital flows and securities.

Bush nominated Warsh as a governor of the Fed in 2006 and at just 35 years old, he became the youngest board member in the history of the Federal Reserve.

Former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke wrote in his memoirs that Warsh’s young age attracted criticism but his political skills, market understanding and many contacts on Wall Street proved valuable.

Warsh is the son-in-law of Ronald Lauder, a close and long-time friend of Trump, who is the president of the World Jewish Congress.

with DPA and AP

China has given its top AI startup DeepSeek approval to buy Nvidia’s H200 artificial intelligence chips with regulatory conditions that are still being ‍finalised, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Reuters reported, citing sources, that ByteDance, Alibaba ​and Tencent had been given permission to purchase more than 400,000 H200 chips in total.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang ⁠told reporters in Taipei on Thursday that his company had not received such information.

He added that he believed that China was still finalising the licence. Nvidia did not respond to a request for comment on DeepSeek’s approval.

China’s industry and commerce ministries have granted approvals for all four companies, but ‌have stipulated that ​they will impose conditions that are still being finalised, the sources said. These conditions ‍are being decided by China’s state planner, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), according to one of the people.

China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Ministry of Commerce and NDRC did not answer requests for comment.

DeepSeek, which rattled the global tech sector early last year by rolling out AI models that ​cost a fraction of those being developed by US ‌rivals such as OpenAI, did not answer a request for comment.

The H200, Nvidia’s second most powerful AI chip, has emerged as ​a major flashpoint in US-China relations. Despite strong demand from Chinese firms and US approval ‍for exports, Beijing’s hesitation to allow imports has been the main barrier to shipments.

The US earlier this month formally cleared the way for Nvidia to sell the H200 to China, ​where ​the company is seeing strong appetite. However, ​Chinese authorities have the final say on whether ​they would allow it to be shipped in.

Any purchases of H200 chips by DeepSeek could draw scrutiny by US politicians. Reuters reported on Wednesday that a senior US politician had alleged that Nvidia had helped DeepSeek hone artificial intelligence models that were later used by the Chinese military, according to a letter sent to US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

DeepSeek is expected to launch its next-generation AI model V4, featuring strong ‍coding capabilities, in mid-February, The Information reported earlier this month.

Global demand for gold surged to all-time highs in 2025, the World Gold Council (WGC) says.  

The London-based group said demand exceeded 5000 tonnes for the first time, reaching a record 5002 tonnes. 

Uncertainty in markets worldwide drove investors to seek a safe haven in the valuable metal, with investments reaching an “unprecedented value” of $US555 billion by the end of the year.  

According to the WGC, securities backed by physical gold were particularly in demand. Investors around the globe turned to gold exchange-traded funds or ETFs in search of a safe haven and diversification, increasing their holdings by 801 tonnes over the course of the year. 

Meanwhile, bar and coin buying “accelerated to reach a 12-year high,” with demand reaching 1374 tonnes or $US154 billion.  

The strongest growth in demand for bars and coins was seen in China and India, with both countries accounting for more than 50 per cent of the increase in this category.

Central banks remain important drivers of demand for gold, as they seek to make their reserves less dependent on the US dollar. The industry association estimates that central banks have increased their gold reserves by 863 tonnes.  

In contrast, demand for gold jewellery weakened significantly last year due to high prices.

Since the start of the year, gold has already become around 30 per cent more expensive, after rising by 65 per cent last year.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers says the federal government is focused on ways to fix housing affordability other than tax reform, as calls grow for a rethink on investor tax breaks.

Housing was the defining intergenerational challenge in Australian society, Dr Chalmers said in an interview with Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz.

A leading light of left-leaning economic policy wonks, Professor Stiglitz offered some typically iconoclastic remedies to Australia’s housing woes.

They included greater government involvement in providing housing, like in Vienna, where up to 60 per cent of residents live in subsidised social housing, as well as better taxing land and capital gains on property.

“Thinking a little bit more about how you can use tax structure, tax reform, to make housing more affordable, and generate revenue, is one part of the agenda,” Prof Stiglitz said in the interview, published in The Monthly on Friday.

Dr Chalmers has fielded his fair share of calls to increase property taxes in recent times, as he recognised in his response.

“Obviously this is a point of some contention in Australia,” he said.

A Greens-led parliamentary inquiry is investigating whether Australia’s 50 per cent discount on capital gains is turbocharging housing inequality by incentivising investors to crowd owner-occupiers out of the property market.

The advice from economists at think tanks including the e61 Institute and the Grattan Institute as well as NSW Treasury is that the discount should be reformed.

“Quite frequently, people who have thought these issues through, as you have, want us to have a look at some of these tax settings,” Dr Chalmers told Professor Stiglitz.

“We’ve been focused on other ways to build more stock in our housing, build more homes around the country.

“But we know that there’ll always be that pressure to do more when it comes to the tax system and how that applies to housing. We listen respectfully to people when they put those views to us.”

The Australian Council of Social Service on Friday urged the government to halve the capital gains tax discount to 25 per cent and phase out negative gearing over five years.

The savings should then be used to build more social housing, the council’s acting chief executive Jacqueline Phillips said.

She cited a Productivity Commission report that revealed the number of households on the public housing waitlist has climbed from around 169,000 in 2024 to 190,000.

“This report today shows housing stress and homelessness are getting worse while absurdly generous tax breaks drive up home prices and supercharge inequality in our society,” Ms Phillips said.

A program for early intervention autism services will be delayed as part of efforts to deliver urgent hospital funding.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese met with premiers and chief ministers in Sydney on Friday for a “landmark” national cabinet meeting where an agreement for an extra $25 billion in funding over the next five years was struck.

He said the deal would ensure access to world-class healthcare and secure the future of the $52 billion National Disability Insurance Scheme.

In a bid to ease the pressure on the NDIS, the federal government offered to delay a $2 billion Thriving Kids program, slated to begin on July 1, until October.

The program aims to move children with mild to moderate autism and those with developmental delays off the NDIS, and into state-run early intervention services.

State governments had warned they were not ready to take responsibility for foundational support, which will be delivered through schools, health clinics and community facilities.

Federal Health Minister Mark Butler said the changes were needed to ensure the sustainability of the NDIS.

“All jurisdictions recognise the need to get the NDIS back on track and ensure it meets its original objectives: caring for people with significant and permanent disabilities,” Mr Butler told ABC Radio before the cabinet meeting.

Asked whether July 1 would be the program’s start date, Mr Butler said it would be fully rolled out after that.

“I’m really just talking several months more than anything significant,” Mr Butler said.

“We only ever committed to the start of services, and we said that we expected the program to be fully rolled out sometime after that.”

Queensland Health Minister Tim Nicholls suggested the states were caught off guard by the program, learning of it when Mr Butler announced it during a National Press Club speech in August.

“We’ve been working our way on what that might look like for Queensland,” he told ABC Radio.

Calling it a “landmark” national cabinet meeting, Mr Albanese said Thriving Kids would “start from this year” with its full implementation to be completed by January 1, 2028.

“The states put to us the possibility of a short delay in the full implementation of Thriving Kids,” the prime minister said.

“We agreed that proposal is reasonable … and so it is a positive move when it comes to government investment and expenditure.”

There would be no changes to the current access arrangements for children on the NDIS until Thriving Kids was implemented, Mr Butler said.

Participants with autism or other developmental delays as their primary disability made up half of those on the NDIS, but just 23 per cent of total payments, according to figures from May 2025.

A media giant has reached a deal to sell its national stable of talkback radio stations to a billionaire businessman and his family.

In a statement to the share market on Friday morning, Nine Entertainment announced the $56 million deal to sell off 2GB Sydney, 3AW Melbourne, 4BC Brisbane, 6PR Perth and 2UE Adelaide.

Nine’s other commercial radio assets, Magic1278 and 4BH, will also be under new management.

Sydney-based pub baron Arthur Laundy and his family had their offer accepted after Nine confirmed in September it had fielded “a number of unsolicited inquiries about our radio business”.

Mr Laundy, who is in his 80s, was ranked No.94 on the AFR’s rich list in 2025 with an estimated net worth of $1.75 billion.

He took over control of the family hotel business after his father and three staff members died in a light plane crash at Wellington’s Burrendong Dam in 1969.

The agenda-setting talkback stations have been under Nine management since the company acquired total control of Macquarie Media in 2019.

It had previously inherited an initial stake in Macquarie Media from its merger with Fairfax Media.

Nine said there were plans for Mr Laundy to utilise Nine News journalists on radio, showcase Stan Sport through his venues and increase advertising spend on Nine properties.

The sale is expected to go through by mid-2026, subject to approval by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

In addition, Nine announced a $850 million deal to buy out-of-home media company QMS and the conversion of NBN Television from a wholly owned business to an affiliate to be owned and operated by regional partner WIN.

The moves marked a “critical milestone” in the transformation of the company, chief executive officer Matt Stanton said.

“These transactions will create a more efficient, higher-growth, and digitally powered Nine Group for our consumers, advertisers, shareholders and people,” he said.

“This positions Nine well for the future, enabling the Group to withstand industry disruption and deliver long-term sustainable value to our shareholders.”

The acquisition of QMS from Quadrant Private Equity will diversify Nine’s revenue streams and add scale to its advertiser and agency relationships, Mr Stanton said.

“We also see the opportunity to promote and drive subscriptions for our publishing mastheads and Stan through leveraging any excess QMS inventory,” he added.

“The QMS network will provide Nine with a branded platform to support key national news and sporting moments and serve as a public service utility for governments at all levels in times of emergency or community need.”

Nine will announce its first half result for the financial year on February 24 and told shareholders it remains committed to a dividend payout ratio of 60 to 80 per cent of net profit before specific items.

But the company warned the impact of cumulative tax losses from the transactions would likely result in unfranked interim and final dividends for this financial year, and an unfranked dividend for next financial year.

Shareholders appeared to show cautious positivity to the news when trading on the Australian Securities Exchange opened at 10am AEDT, with Nine’s share price up more than 3 per cent.

But the company share price is still 20 per cent lower than 12 months ago.

Australian farmers should prepare for “geopolitical surprises” in 2026 as erratic trade policies enacted by the Trump Administration continue to shape markets.

Agribusiness bank Rabobank has flagged geopolitics and shipping as the top risk factors facing producers this year.

“With United States President Donald Trump not slowing down in the second year of his second term, further geopolitical surprises are likely this year,” RaboResearch general manager Stefan Vogel said.

“Commodity markets – from energy to fertilisers to agri goods – may feel the effects,” he said.

Early in 2025, the US placed tariffs on Australian beef that were later abolished, creating uncertainty for producers despite doing little to dent exports into America.

US demand for Australian beef actually increased in 2025 despite the 10 per cent border levy, though Mr Vogel warned that with most American tariffs on the protein now ditched, Australia can expect more competition from South America in the US market.

“Meanwhile, China’s newly-introduced beef import quotas present additional challenges for both Australian and Brazilian beef importers,” he said.

Australian meat producers can expect prices to perform relatively well in 2026 overall, as well as wool and dairy prices.

The outlook for grains, oilseeds, pulses, cotton and sugar are projected to stay more subdued over the next 12 months, with an abundance of global grain supplies.

Overall, Mr Vogel said the agricultural sector was “well-positioned” to weather any challenges. 

For Australian households, food price growth should be “less of an issue” in 2026 than the year prior, the bank’s agribusiness outlook determined, though some items will still more expensive than hoped.

With overall inflation figures coming in hotter-than-expected for the December quarter and the unemployment rate heading lower, interest rate hikes are predicted by a number of economists. 

The outlook supports a stronger Australian dollar than in 2025, boosting import purchasing power for domestic agricultural businesses but softening export returns in local currency.

The agricultural sector is also at the mercy of climate and weather shifts, with an El Nino – linked to drier conditions – a possibility in the second half of the year.

The Bureau of Meteorology’s long-range forecast points to warmer-than-typical temperatures and near-to-below-normal rainfall through to May, for most of the continent, bar the north. 

“The prospects for agriculture will depend heavily on how weather conditions evolve,” Mr Vogel said.

More all-time temperature records have been smashed across Australia’s interior as a climate change-fuelled heatwave grips the continent.

Some of the hottest temperatures included the outback South Australian town of Maree, where the mercury nudged 49.8C.

Roxby Downs recorded 49.6C, while Woomera hit 48.5C and Leigh Creek climbed to 48.2C – all temperatures never before seen.

Maree was the hottest spot on the planet for a day, according to online world temperatures site El Dorado Weather.

Australia also claimed all of the top 15 hottest spots in the world over the 24 hours to 8am on Thursday.

Senior meteorologist Dean Narramore said the blistering heat had broken dozens of temperature records across South Australia, NSW and Victoria over the course of a week.

He said what made this event more unusual was its longevity, which meant there was more time for heat to build up.

“This situation had a bit of a blocking pattern,” the the Bureau of Meteorology forecaster told AAP.

“So the heat has just sat over us and just kind of wobbled around the southeastern part of the country (with) no strong cold front to come in and clear it out.”

Mr Narramore said the records that had been broken were multigenerational, with some having stood for a century.

“They’re not just 10 or 20 years old, they’re 30, 50, 80 and in some cases 100 years old,” he said.

“A lot of the records have been similar to a heatwave back in 1939, so that’s going back a long way.”

Heatwave warnings remain in place for NSW, Victoria, Queensland, WA, SA, the ACT and NT on Friday.

Maree (49C), Port Augusta (49C), Roxby Downs (48C), Moomba (47C) and other east and northeast parts of SA were in for another doozy.

The mercury was also expected to get to 47C in Birdsville, 46C in Mildura, 45C in Broken Hill and 43C in Wagga Wagga.

Of the capitals, Adelaide (41C) and Canberra (40C) will face the brunt of the heat.

Mr Narramore said climate change was a contributing factor in the conditions.

“Obviously there is background warming so there’s more energy and more heat in the atmosphere,” he said.

“So when the systems align for these extreme scenarios, they are just a little bit warmer and last that little bit longer.”

The severe to extreme conditions are forecast to ease for almost all parts of the country by Sunday, bringing an end to the so-called “heat dome”.

But more heatwaves may be in store this summer, with the whole of February and March to come.

Mr Narramore said average temperatures in Australia were between one to one and a half degrees higher than they were a century ago.

The federal government’s National Climate Risk Assessment, released last September, projected that the number of severe heatwave days per year would double at 2C of warming and quadruple at 3C.

Heat-related deaths are projected to quintuple at 3C of warming.