Iran’s currency has dropped to a record low, according to Iranian currency tracking websites, weeks after protests sparked by the rial’s dwindling value rocked the country.

The websites said the currency was worth 765,000 rials to the Australian dollar ​on Tuesday.

The ⁠rial has lost about five per cent of its value over the course of this month, according to data from the currency tracking website Bonbast.com.

Iran’s newly appointed Central Bank Governor Abdolnaser Hemmati said on Tuesday that “the foreign exchange market is following its natural course.”

What began as protests on December 28 over economic hardship in Tehran’s ‌Grand Bazaar quickly ​morphed into the worst legitimacy crisis for Iran’s clerical establishment as it spread across the country ‍with protesters demanding a political change.

Security forces crushed the unrest, which abated earlier this month, with the bloodiest crackdown since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Amid the protests, the government had introduced a subsidy reform, replacing preferential currency exchange rates for importers with direct transfers to Iranians to boost their purchasing power for essential goods.

Iran’s First ​Vice-President Mohammadreza Aref defended the policy on Monday, saying ‌corruption had made preferential rates ineffective in tackling inflation for basic goods, and that the new system aimed at stabilising the foreign ​exchange rate.

Monthly inflation for households has continued to rise, with year-on-year inflation reaching 60 per cent for the ‍period December 21 to January 19, according to figures released by the Statistical Centre of Iran on Sunday.

Meanwhile, Iran’s online economy has been battered by an internet blackout imposed since January 8 ​and ​still largely in place.

A government spokesperson said ​on Tuesday that while the government prefers free internet access, ​security considerations required maintaining restrictions.

Iranian authorities blamed the recent unrest on “armed terrorists and rioters” linked to Tehran’s foes, the United States and Israel.

US President Donald Trump repeatedly threatened Tehran with intervention, to which an Iranian official warned that any attack would be treated as an “all-out war.”

According to figures released on Tuesday by US-based rights group HRANA, the verified unrest-related death toll has reached 6126, including 214 security personnel.

Official figures have put the ‍death toll at 3117. Reuters was unable to independently verify the numbers.

TikTok has agreed to settle a landmark social media addiction lawsuit just before the trial kicked off, the plaintiff’s lawyers say. 

The social video platform was one of three companies – along with Meta’s Instagram and Google’s YouTube – facing claims that their platforms deliberately addict and harm children. A fourth company named in the lawsuit, Snapchat parent company Snap Inc., settled the case last week for an undisclosed sum.

Details of the settlement with TikTok were not disclosed, and the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

At the core of the case is a 19-year-old identified only by the initials “KGM,” whose case could determine how thousands of other, similar lawsuits against social media companies will play out. 

She and two other plaintiffs have been selected for bellwether trials – essentially test cases for both sides to see how their arguments play out before a jury and what damages, if any, may be awarded, said Clay Calvert, a nonresident senior fellow of technology policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.

Joseph VanZandt, co-lead counsel for the plaintiff, said in a statement Tuesday that TikTok remains a defendant in the other personal injury cases, and that the trial will proceed as scheduled against Meta and YouTube. 

Jury selection starts this week in the Los Angeles County Superior Court. It’s the first time the companies will argue their case before a jury, and the outcome could have profound effects on their businesses and how they will handle children using their platforms. 

The selection process is expected to take at least a few days, with 75 potential jurors questioned each day through to at least Thursday. 

KGM claims that her use of social media from an early age addicted her to the technology and exacerbated depression and suicidal thoughts. 

Importantly, the lawsuit claims that this was done through deliberate design choices made by companies that sought to make their platforms more addictive to children to boost profits. This argument, if successful, could sidestep the companies’ First Amendment shield and Section 230, which protects tech companies from liability for material posted on their platforms. 

“Borrowing heavily from the behavioural and neurobiological techniques used by slot machines and exploited by the cigarette industry, Defendants deliberately embedded in their products an array of design features aimed at maximising youth engagement to drive advertising revenue,” the lawsuit says. 

Executives, including Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, are expected to testify at the trial, which will last six to eight weeks. Experts have drawn similarities to the Big Tobacco trials that led to a 1998 settlement requiring cigarette companies to pay billions in health care costs and restrict marketing targeting minors. 

The tech companies dispute the claims that their products deliberately harm children, citing a bevy of safeguards they have added over the years and arguing that they are not liable for content posted on their sites by third parties. 

The prime minister will seek to improve a complicated relationship between Australia and East Timor when he addresses the small island nation’s parliament.

During his first visit to one of our closest neighbours, Anthony Albanese will on Wednesday highlight Australia’s contributions to the country, including the government’s support for Timorese independence in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

“In dark times, it is our friendship and our innate respect for each other, for democracy and for sovereignty that will prevail,” Mr Albanese will say in his speech to the country’s parliament, according to extracts provided to AAP.

“As the Prime Minister of Australia, I say to you today and to the courageous Timorese people you represent: your Australian friends will never forget you.”

Mr Albanese is not expected to make any announcements about an ongoing dispute over access to gas fields in the Timor Sea.

East Timor has long demanded that gas extracted from the sea, which sits between the country and Australia, should be piped to its south coast for processing.

Until recently, Woodside, which operates the fields, has insisted it would be cheaper to send the gas to Darwin.

In late 2025, the energy giant signed an agreement to investigate building a gas plant in East Timor, but the project still needs to clear a number of major hurdles.

Gordon Peake, a researcher and author who lived in the country from 2007 to 2011, said the ongoing stalemate has been a “thorn in the side” of the relationship between the two countries, and Timorese officials would be hoping for tangible progress from Mr Albanese’s visit.

“The Timorese are going to be really hoping that the prime minister’s visit is not just handshakes and smiles and honeyed words,” he told AAP.

Mr Albanese’s visit is complicated by a messy history between the two countries, Dr Peake added.

In 1975, the then-Whitlam government recognised Indonesia’s occupation of East Timor, also known as Timor-Leste, and struck an oil and gas deal with Indonesia.

“The Timorese think that they are owed by Australia for Australia’s past chicanery in Timor-Leste, for kind of looking the other way whenever the Indonesians invaded,” Dr Peake said.

Along with his address to East Timor’s parliament, Mr Albanese is expected to meet with Prime Minister Xanana Gusmão and President José Ramos-Horta during his visit.

Despite the threat of higher interest rates and rising affordability pressures, real estate agents and finance professionals remain bullish about property prices this year.

But a divergence is opening up between the NSW and Victorian markets and the mid-tier markets of Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia, data analytics firm Cotality found in its Decoding 2026 report, released on Wednesday.

With the Reserve Bank now expected to hike borrowing costs this year, sentiment has eased from 2025, when three interest rate cuts propelled national dwelling values up 8.6 per cent.

Of the more than 1100 professionals across real estate, banking, lending and adjacent property sectors surveyed by Cotality, 87 per cent expected dwelling values to rise, with 44 per cent expecting price growth of more than five per cent.

Sentiment remained positive in Sydney – the most expensive and rate-sensitive city – but was more dependent on what the RBA does than in other cities, Cotality research director Tim Lawless said.

Shannan Whitney, director of Sydney-based real estate group BresicWhitney, expected prices to continue to grow in the harbour city, although sentiment was more cautious.

With buyers stretched to their limits, even the uncertain geopolitical environment was having a cooling effect on purchasing appetites, he said.

“On either side of the transaction – buyers or sellers – it doesn’t feel like anyone’s got any really strong feelings about how the market’s going to go,” he told AAP.

“On the balance of things, I think it’s going to be pretty balanced and firm.”

As is playing out across the country, Mr Whitney expected the lower end of the Sydney market to continue to outpace the premium end, driven by affordability constraints and the federal government’s expanded five per cent deposit guarantee scheme for first homebuyers.

More than three-quarters of real estate agents reported increased activity following the scheme’s expansion, although sharp price growth is already impacting eligibility, with less than half of Australian suburbs’s median values below price caps.

Meanwhile, structural headwinds continued to keep properties relatively affordable in Melbourne, Cotality found.

Higher property taxes continued to dampen investor enthusiasm while weaker interstate migration was limiting growth in demand.

Conversely, strong population growth was expected to keep supporting growth in Queensland and WA.

“The bullish outlook for Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia largely reflects trends that have been in place for several years,” Mr Lawless said.

“Strong internal migration across Queensland and WA, relatively better affordability compared with Sydney, and a persistent shortfall in housing supply have combined to support stronger price growth, and those factors remain largely intact.”

To hike or not to hike?

The Reserve Bank’s first interest rate decision of the year comes down to one figure in Wednesday’s Australian Bureau of Statistics inflation print.

While the central bank will take a range of factors into account at its upcoming meeting on February 3, hotter-than-expected household spending and jobs figures have sharpened the focus on the RBA’s preferred measure of inflation – the trimmed mean.

Analysts widely expect another forecast beat, compared to the RBA’s latest estimates in November, would force governor Michele Bullock’s board into an embarrassing about face on interest rates.

Economists at NAB are tipping the trimmed mean to come in at 0.9 per cent for the December quarter, which would push the annual figure up to 3.3 per cent – above the RBA’s forecast of 3.2 per cent.

As a result, NAB expects the RBA to hike in February and again in May.

Following a surprisingly strong jobs report last week, money markets have swung in behind NAB’s hawkish view, with traders pricing in about a 60 per cent chance of a February hike and two rises priced in by the end of the year.

But the forecaster consensus is for the trimmed mean to come in 0.8 per cent, which would be in line with the RBA’s prediction.

That’s what Harry Murphy Cruise, Oxford Economics Australia’s head of economic research, is predicting too.

If borne out on Wednesday, he expects it to make the RBA’s call a line-ball affair.

But much of the resurgence in spending and inflation came from data that pre-dates the rise in interest rate expectations.

“I think that warrants just waiting to see, because all of the forward indicators suggest that households have been spooked by this talk of rate hikes, and are likely to then flow that into their behaviour around spending,” Mr Murphy Cruise told AAP.

“And it’s where communication is so, so important for the RBA.

“They can get responses from households and businesses without necessarily hiking and a really hawkish hold can also be enough to sway households.”

Westpac economists, meanwhile, are expecting the trimmed mean to come in below the RBA’s forecast at 0.7 per cent quarter-on-quarter.

“An outcome at this level or lower should be enough to stay the RBA’s hand, at least for now,” Westpac chief economist Luci Ellis said.

“The rhetoric would remain hawkish, but such a result would support the RBA’s earlier assessment that some of the surprise September quarter inflation result reflected temporary factors.”

Liberals and Nationals are locked in a tense stand-off nearly a week after their dramatic split, as the heads of both parties hold off naming new shadow ministries which would make the divorce more permanent.

Conservative challengers are circling Opposition Leader Sussan Ley after the political break-up, and supporters of rival Liberal leadership contender Andrew Hastie claim they have the numbers to challenge for the top job – a suggestion hotly disputed by Ms Ley’s supporters.

The Nationals’ departure from the coalition means Ms Ley needs to reassign the portfolios held by the regional party, including key areas such as trade, agriculture, resources and emergency management.

Multiple Liberal sources told AAP on Tuesday that Ms Ley was yet to offer any of the Nationals’ former jobs to her Liberal team, but insiders were divided over the reason.

Two Liberal politicians said their leader was holding out hope the Nationals would return to the fold.

Members of both parties believe naming separate front benches would cement the already-acrimonious split.

“I still think she hopes the Nats will come back and (assigning new portfolios is) not something she needs to do yet,” one senior Liberal said.

But another source believed Ms Ley, who could face a leadership challenge as soon as next week, was hoping to bolster her support base by essentially trading portfolios for votes.

The Nationals will also need to name their own front bench as they strike out on their own in parliament.

But two sources inside the regional party said there had been no conversations about a carve-up of shadow ministries.

The split between the Liberals and Nationals was triggered by a disagreement over new hate crimes reforms – the Liberals voted for the contentious legislation while the Nationals voted against it, citing concerns about free speech.

During the ugly saga, all shadow ministers from the regional party resigned from Ms Ley’s front bench and Nationals leader David Littleproud declared the once-strong coalition was no more.

The sequence of events has destabilised Ms Ley’s leadership, with conservative Liberals Angus Taylor and Andrew Hastie both believed to be canvassing for votes.

MPs have been mostly holding their fire because a memorial service for late Victorian Liberal MP Katie Allen is being held on Thursday.

Dr Allen, a doctor before she entered federal parliament, died in late 2025 from a rare form of cancer known as cholangiocarcinoma.

Mr Hastie’s camp indicated the leadership contest would likely heat up on Thursday afternoon, once the service had wrapped up.

While Mr Hastie’s supporters insist they have the numbers for a challenge, this claim is disputed by moderates who believe Ms Ley’s leadership is safe, for now.

One moderate source also claimed neither Mr Hastie’s supporters, nor Mr Taylor’s, had reached out to the faction to ask for support.

Heatwave conditions are set to continue across inland regions of south-east Australia, as coastal cities enjoy a brief reprieve after record-breaking temperatures.

Residents living at Renmark, in South Australia’s Riverland region, experienced their hottest day on record on Tuesday, with temperatures reaching 49.6C, while Victoria smashed its own heat record as Walpeup in the state’s north hit 48.9C.

Cooler conditions are expected for much of Victoria on Wednesday, although the heatwave gripping inland regional areas is far from over. 

Senior meteorologist Dean Narramore told AAP that hot air was pushing into north-west NSW and Queensland, bringing another day of extreme fire danger and scorching conditions.

Mildura, in Victoria’s Mallee region, won’t see any relief from the heat, with the regional city set to remain in the 40Cs until at least Sunday.

“We are expecting another four days of above 40 degree temperatures and overnight temperatures in the mid-20s in the north of the state,” Emergency Management Commissioner Tim Wiebusch said.

An extreme heatwave warning remains in place for several regions on Wednesday, including the Mallee, Wimmera, Northern Country, East Gippsland, West and South Gippsland and North Central regions.

Victorian Chief Health Officer Caroline McElnay said severe heatwave conditions are dangerous for many vulnerable people in the community. 

“It can cause potentially fatal health problems such as heat exhaustion and heat stroke, but it can also trigger events like heart attacks or stroke,” Dr McElnay told reporters on Tuesday.

“Please take steps to protect yourself and others by keeping cool. Stay hydrated. Plan ahead to avoid the heat and check in with others.”

Melburnians will experience a top of 24C on Wednesday, while residents living in Adelaide will see a high of 30C. 

It’s a far cry from conditions experienced just 24 hours earlier, with Melbourne recording a top of 42C, a few degrees short of its record high of 46.4C set on February 7, 2009.

Mildura hit a top of 48.6C, marking its hottest day on record, while the nearby towns of Hopetoun and Ouyen climbed to a scorching 48.9C. 

Records were broken on Monday in Adelaide where the temperature reached 44.7C, exceeding the city’s previous Australia Day heat record set in 2006.

Ceduna, northwest of the SA capital, climbed to 49C, surpassing its previous record, while NSW town Dubbo reached 46.1C to record its hottest January day.

India and the European Union have finalised a landmark trade deal that will represent ‍a quarter of the world’s economy, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi says.

After nearly two decades of on-off negotiations, ⁠the deal will pave the way for India to open up its vast and guarded market, the world’s largest, to free trade with the 27-nation EU, its biggest trading partner.

“Yesterday, a big agreement was signed between the European Union and India,” Modi said.

“People around the world are calling ‌this the mother ​of all deals. This agreement will bring major opportunities for the 1.4 billion people ‍of India and the millions of people in Europe,” he said.

He added the agreement represents 25 per cent of global GDP and one-third of global trade.

Modi and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen are expected to make a joint announcement at an India–EU summit in New Delhi, along with ​the details of the deal, later on Tuesday.

Trade between ‌India and the EU stood at $US136.5 billion ($A197.4 billion) in the fiscal year through March 2025.

The agreement comes days after the ​EU signed a pivotal pact with the South American bloc Mercosur, following deals last year with ‍Indonesia, Mexico and Switzerland.

During the same period, New Delhi finalised pacts with Britain, New Zealand and Oman.

The spate of deals underscores global efforts to hedge against the United ​States ​as President Donald Trump’s bid ​to take over Greenland and tariff threats on European ​nations test longstanding alliances among Western nations.

Trump has imposed a 50 per cent tariff on goods from India and an India-US trade deal collapsed last year after a breakdown in communication between the two governments.

The formal signing of the India-EU deal would take place after legal vetting expected to last five to six months, an Indian government official aware of the matter has said.

“We expect the deal to ‍be implemented within a year,” the official added.

The first shipment of liquefied natural gas from the Barossa project is on its way to Japan, with energy company Santos calling it an outstanding achievement for a project of such scale and complexity.

In an ASX announcement on Tuesday, Santos chief executive officer Kevin Gallagher said the cargo left Darwin on the Kool Blizzard on Sunday bound for Japan’s Sakai terminal. 

The Barossa gas field, about 300 kilometres north of Darwin, has faced a series of delays.

Santos is the operator and has a 50 per cent interest in the gas project with joint venture partners PRISM Energy International Australia (37.5 per cent) and JERA Australia (12.5 per cent).

Mr Gallagher said it was a major milestone for Barossa LNG, with Santos delivering the project within about six months of the planned start date and within the original budget, without drawing on additional contingency.

“This is an outstanding achievement for a project of this scale and complexity in the global offshore upstream sector.

“It demonstrates Santos’ self-execution capability in delivering major development projects and the success of our disciplined, low-cost operating model.”

Mr Gallagher said he was proud of the way Santos navigated through the COVID-19 pandemic, regulatory approvals, legal challenges and supply chain disruptions during the construction phase.

In early 2024 Santos won a federal court challenge lodged by Tiwi Islands elders over its Barossa plans, allowing it to resume laying an underwater pipeline for its $6.1 billion project.

The elders had wanted Santos to revise its environment management plan to include potential risks to underwater sacred sites.

Environment groups and energy experts, meanwhile, recently raised concerns about the Darwin facility’s storage tank leaking methane for years.

Barossa LNG will continue to drive a stronger economy for the Northern Territory and Territorians, Mr Gallagher said.

The 2025-26 NT budget papers forecast Gross State Product to rebound by 7.8 per cent for the year, largely driven by Barossa LNG exports, he said.

The project would also secure about 300 permanent jobs in the NT for the next 20 years, with an estimated $A2.5 billion worth of wages and contracts expected to flow for Territorians over that time.

The Barossa Aboriginal Future Fund had been founded to invest in coastal communities, receiving up to $10 million a year from Barossa LNG, Mr Gallagher said.

The fund will promote projects to improve community services, establish pathways to training, jobs and business opportunities, and enable Aboriginal people to maintain cultural practices and care for country.

President Donald Trump says he’s increasing tariffs on South Korean imports into the US related to autos, ​lumber and pharmaceuticals to 25 per cent, while accusing the ally’s legislature of “not living up” to its trade deal with Washington.

“South Korea’s Legislature is ⁠not living up to its Deal with the United States,” Trump wrote on social media.

“Because the Korean Legislature hasn’t enacted our Historic Trade Agreement, which is their prerogative, I am hereby increasing South Korean TARIFFS on Autos, Lumber, Pharma, and all other Reciprocal TARIFFS, from 15% to 25%.”

It was not clear when the tariff hike would take effect.

South Korea’s presidential office and the US Trade Representative’s office did ‌not respond immediately ​to requests for comment. Trump has previously threatened other tariff hikes and in some cases delayed them or not ‍followed through.

South Korea had been working to implement a deal announced with Washington last year that lowered US tariffs against many of its exports to 15 per cent.

But earlier this month, South Korea’s finance minister said the country’s planned investment of $US350 billion ($A506 billion) in strategic US sectors under the trade deal was unlikely to kick off in the first half of 2026, citing the weak won currency.

The prospect of large currency ​outflows has caused headaches for authorities in Seoul at a time when ‌the won has slumped to trade at levels unseen since the global financial crisis from 2007 to 2009.

Trump has used the leverage of tariffs throughout his second term in ​office in his foreign policy. Economists have raised concerns about the approach and the policy also faces a test in an ‍ongoing case at the US Supreme Court.

In the deal reached between the allies last year, Washington and Seoul agreed to set tariffs on US imports of Korean autos and auto parts at 15 per cent, down from 25 per cent, putting them on par ​with ​their Japanese competitors.

The two countries said last year ​that as part of the $US350 billion ($A506 billion) South Korean investment into US ​strategic sectors, Seoul would pay $US200 billion ($A289 billion) in cash in phased installments that would be capped at $US20 billion ($A29 billion) a year in an effort to maintain won stability.