Australia’s share market is heading for its first positive session this week, after precious metals surged on a US government bond market intervention.

The S&P/ASX200 rose 11.7 points by midday, up 0.13 per cent, to 9,065.5, as the broader All Ordinaries advanced 21.7 points, or 0.23 per cent, to 9,276.9.

It came after a modest rebound in US stocks overnight as the US government announced support for long-dated government bonds, after a global sell-off had unnerved investors.

That triggered a relief rally rather than over a fresh wave of optimism, Moomoo dealing manager Paco Chow said.

“The recovery came after the US Treasury announced plans to double buybacks of longer-dated bonds,” Mr Chow said.

“That additional demand helped ease borrowing costs, which had climbed sharply.”

The intervention came as US government debt reached $US40 trillion ($A56.2 trillion), and as Australia’s sovereign debt has topped $1 trillion for the first time.

Falling bond yields sent gold and other precious metals surging, with spot gold above $US4,520 ($A6,356) an ounce for the first time since early June.

The local gold sub-index rocketed eight per cent higher, with strong leads from Evolution and Newmont, along with Northern Star after an in-line earnings result.

BHP also did some heavy-lifting, with its shares up 2.2 per cent to $65.08, just 87 cents short of record highs.

Fortescue slipped 0.6 per cent after after its full-year bottom-line profit slumped to $US2.9 billion ($A4 billion) due to a $737 million write-off of its green metal Iron Bridge mine, while underlying earnings improved.

The health care sector continued its strong rebound, up more than two per cent, as CSL continued its post-earnings rally and segment-based buying persisted.

Local technology stocks performed well, and the energy sector gained 0.8 per cent as crude prices continued to edge higher.

The heavyweight financials sector fell almost two per cent, with insurers weighing heavily as Medibank tumbled, despite improving its underlying full-year profit 2.9 per cent to $636.8 million.

The major banks continued to sell off, with CommBank leading the big four lower with a 2.1 per cent slump to 10-week lows of $157.21 per share.

Consumer cyclical stocks eased 0.2 per cent in a mixed session for the sector.

Supercheap Auto owner Super Retail was a stand out, with its shares rocketing more than 16 per cent higher after growing total sales 3.2 per cent despite a tough retail environment.

In other earnings news, Cleanaway’s full-year statutory net profit tumbled by more than a third to $98.5 million, but its $2.62 share price still found support from EQT’s recent $3.13 per share takeover bid.

The Australian dollar is buying 71.15 US cents, up from 70.75 US cents on Wednesday at 5pm AEST, but easing slightly after a weaker-than-expected jobs report.

An online register to give people the choice to avoid gambling advertising could be operational within a year. 

Communications Minister Anika Wells is confident the Australian Communications and Media Authority will be able to roll out the so-called AdStop register within 12 months.

“We have built similar things before,” she told reporters in Canberra on Thursday, noting the media watchdog had to build BetStop, a self-exclusion register for gamblers, in recent years.

“It’s automated … it won’t be on the user. This technology exists. We’ve built it, and yeah, it took a while to build it, but we know how to do it now.”

The five-year lead up to rolling out the BetStop self-exclusion register won’t be repeated, Ms Wells said.

Labor’s gambling reform to ban ads on sports jerseys and stadiums, limit broadcast content and introduce an opt-out register passed the parliament late on Wednesday night.

It is now illegal for gambling companies to offer inducements to problem gamblers during the first three months on the self-exclusion register.

The peak body for betting agencies has criticised the bill for over-complicating the sector and driving punters to unregulated offshore gambling companies.

Responsible Wagering Australia chief executive Kai Cantwell said the measures will significantly limit the ability to advertise gambling to adults.

But the communications minister has welcomed the possibility of all gambling ads being removed from the internet as a result.

“What a great outcome that would be,” Ms Wells said.

“The number one way you can make sure that you comply with the law … is to not show gambling ads.

“And if you want to show gambling ads, then you’re going to have to jump through these hoops.”

Mr Cantwell warned the illegal offshore wagering market operates outside the reach of any opt-out or ad-stop mechanism.

Independent senator David Pocock dismissed the legislation for falling tragically short of the recommendations from a Labor-led inquiry.

“Nothing happened for three years. They were finally sort of forced into doing something, and they’ve done the absolute bare minimum,” Senator Pocock told News24.

“We failed on inducements, and we failed on a national regulator.”

Aussies continue to spend on fitness despite living-cost pressures weighing on households, results from Rebel Sport’s owner shows.

Super Retail, which also owns Supercheap Auto, Macpac, and BCF, grew its total sales 3.2 per cent to $4.2 billion in the 2025/26 financial year, while operating profit increased 2.1 per cent to $774 million.

Rebel was the crown jewel, with sales growth of 4.5 per cent to $1.4 billion, as Aussies splurged on sports equipment, accessories and recovery aids.

The group delivered a solid full-year result, managing director and chief executive Paul Bradshaw said.

“Achieving record sales in the face of significant headwinds that included geopolitical instability in the Middle East, unfavourable weather and increasing interest rate pressure on households,” he said.

“In my first nine months as CEO, I have seen firsthand the commitment of our 15,500 team members and their ability to respond quickly to external challenges to our business.”

After a positive first half, the Middle East fuel crisis disrupted transport and sent prices higher, while a series of interest rate rises also weighed on consumer confidence.

Warmer than average winters in Victoria and NSW also led to a 4.2 per cent slump in like-for-like sales at Macpac in the second half.

The fuel crisis had a two-stage effect on consumers, but Supercheap Auto had been well-positioned as households looked to maintain existing assets, Mr Bradshaw said.

“Once we got over the shock of the war and the impact on fuel, then we saw a change, and consumers were probably less in their leisure activity, but certainly taking care of the vehicles they’ve got,” he said.

The group’s statutory net profit after tax came in at $206 million, down 7.2 per cent on the previous year as it continued to grow, opening 28 new stores and closing 13.

Investors and analysts were impressed with the result, as the $306 million pre-tax profit beat consensus estimates by seven per cent.

Super Retail shares rocketed 16 per cent higher in early trade, buoyed by the result and rebounding after soft performances from JB Hi-Fi and Temple and Webster dragged on the broader sector earlier in the week.

Rebel produced the strongest sales growth, up 4.5 per cent for the year, followed by Supercheap Auto (+3.9 per cent), Macpac (+3.5 per cent) and BFC (+0.2 per cent).

The group announced a final dividend of 33 cents per share, taking the total payout for the year to 65 cents per share, coming in at the upper end of forecasts.

Leadership didn’t provide forward guidance, but the first seven weeks of 2026/27 had been mixed, with total sales up 3.5 per cent, while Macpac grossed 10.2 per cent less than a year earlier.

The iron ore giant founded by billionaire climate crusader Andrew Forrest has posted a drop in statutory profit due to issues with its move into green metals and a court case brought by traditional owners.

Fortescue’s statutory profit fell 15 per cent to $US2.86 billion ($4 billion) for the 12 months to June 30, the company announced Thursday.

That’s in part due to a US$525 million ($737 million) non-cash impairment on its troubled Iron Bridge magnetite mine as well as $150.1 million in compensation that Fortescue was ordered to pay the Yindjibarndi Ngurra Aboriginal Corporation in May.

Fortescue sees Iron Bridge as a step toward lower-emission steelmaking because magnetite has a higher iron content than hematite, which is predominantly mined in the Pilbara, and improves furnace efficiency, creating fewer carbon emissions.

However, the mine has never achieved its nameplate capacity of 22 million tonnes, with Fortescue on Thursday predicting Iron Bridge would produce just 11 to 14 million tonnes in 2026/27, so under accounting rules it has had to write down its estimated value of the asset.

During a conference call on Thursday, Fortescue Metals and Operations chief executive Dino Otranto dismissed an analyst’s suggestion that the company might consider a curtailment of Iron Bridge’s operations given that it looks set to make its third straight cash loss this year.

“We’re going to keep ramping this up, mate,” Mr Otranto said. “We believe in the asset. We believe it’s a differentiator in terms of our products.

”For the next year or so now, it’s full steam ahead.”

Fortescue said the compensation claim represented a $US73 million ($102 million) hit to its bottom line.

The Federal Court ordered the $150.1 million payout to the Yindjibarndi group on May 12 after the company dug up millions of tonnes of iron ore from their lands without their permission.

Fortescue’s underlying profit, which excludes those two issues, rose three per cent to $US3.5 billion ($4.9 billion).

The figures were in-line with with expectations, with underlying earnings slightly above consensus estimates, RBC Capital Markets analyst James Redfern said.

The company ended the year with US$5.1 billion ($7.1 billion) in cash and a net debt of just $0.9 billion, Mr Otranto said.

”That puts us in a strong position to continue investing in growth while delivering returns to shareholders,” he said.

Fortescue didn’t address the Yindjibarndi court case on Thursday but did note it had awarded $1 billion in contracts to Aboriginal businesses in 2025/26, up five per cent from a year ago.

Fortescue will pay a fully franked final dividend of 46 cents per share, taking its full-year dividends to $1.08, down from $1.10 last year.

In early trading Fortescue shares were changing hands for $18.195, up 0.8 per cent from Wednesday’s close.

Australia’s largest listed health insurer has seen a rise in the number of customers taking advantage of its wellbeing programs, after lifting its annual earnings.

Medibank Private paid out $6.9 billion in health insurance claims to its more than six million customers in the 2025/26 year.

“Despite this, people continue to prioritise their health,” chief executive David Koczkar said on Thursday.

“More than half (or 57 per cent) of our health insurance customers are now engaging with our health and wellbeing offerings.”

Medibank posted a 27.5 per cent lift in 2025/26 net profit to $638.7 million for the year ended June 30.

Its underlying net profit totalled $636.8 million, up 2.9 per cent, on an eight per cent lift in health insurance revenue to $8.7 billion.

Medibank raised its health insurance premiums by an average of 5.1 per cent from April.

“The pressure on households is clear,” Mr Koczkar said.

“One in four people in Australia say they have delayed or avoided seeing a GP because of cost.

“Affordability isn’t tomorrow’s challenge – it’s today’s.”

The number of GP clinics in Medibank’s network charging no out-of-pocket fees has increased by 56 per cent, following the federal government’s bulk billing reforms.

“But the health system remains under strain,” Mr Koczkar said.

“That’s why we need to shift from funding illness to funding health, and why accelerating the health transition has never been more important.”

Medibank declared a final dividend of 10.9 cents, taking the total for the year to 19.2 cents.

The government has called in the Israeli ambassador after soldiers were cleared over an air strike that killed Australian aid worker Zomi Franckom.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Australia was outraged the Israeli government had decided not to pursue criminal proceedings against those responsible for killing Ms Frankcom and her World Central Kitchen colleagues.

Israel’s military announced on Wednesday night AEST it had completed reviews of 150 incidents of troop conduct in Gaza and made decisions on five cases, including the April 1 2024 attack on an aid convoy that included Ms Franckom.

The military said ‌there was “no ⁠reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct that would justify the opening of ​a criminal investigation”.

Senator Wong said in a statement: “Zomi represented the best of Australia. Her courage deserves to be celebrated. Her family deserves justice.

“This decision falls far short of the accountability we expect.”

The Australian government and Ms Frankcom’s family have demanded transparency and accountability from Israel over her death, when an air strike hit a World Central Kitchen aid convoy in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

The convoy was marked, but the Israeli military initially claimed it was being used by Hamas before later acknowledging the misidentification and errors in the decision-making process.

Two Israeli officers were dismissed from their positions and three senior officers were formally reprimanded, according to the Israeli military.

Australia has requested audio of the drone strike footage on behalf of the family, and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese raised Ms Frankcom’s death with Israeli President Isaac Herzog during the leader’s visit in February.

“Democracies seek and accept higher standards. The Australian government will not stop pressing Israel for justice for Zomi and her colleagues,” Senator Wong said.

Israeli ambassador Hillel Newman had been called in by Senator Wong, who has also directed Australia’s ambassador to Israel to convey the government’s views directly to Israel.

The government is considering its next steps, Senator Wong said.

Israel’s decision was announced on World Humanitarian Day, which Senator Wong noted was ” especially insulting to Zomi’s loved ones, humanitarians and all Australians”.

A lawyer for the family of British aid worker Jim Henderson, who was also killed in the strike, said the strikes on multiple World Kitchen vehicles showed “gross negligence” by military soldiers that demanded further inquiry.

“This is a systematic annihilation of those who would help Palestinians,” Henderson family lawyer Forz Khan told ABC Radio National on Thursday.

Ukrainian politicians have appointed a new defence minister, hours after his ousted predecessor dealt ‌a major blow to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy with a call for elections in wartime. 

Yevhenii Khmara, a former top special forces operative, takes up the critical defence portfolio amid fresh political turmoil for the president, who had faced weeks of protests ‌over his dismissal of 35-year-old reformer Mykhailo Fedorov.

Khmara’s appointment also took place just hours after anti-corruption authorities announced charges against a deputy chief of Zelenskiy’s office as part of an alleged $US3 million ($A4.2 million) money-laundering scheme. 

Fedorov’s removal as defence minister in July brought thousands of demonstrators ‌onto the streets in rare wartime protests over a surprise shake-up seen as poorly communicated to the public at a critical time in the war with Russia.

Fedorov’s bold call for elections in the fifth year of fighting drew accusations of populism in a country where a majority of people still oppose a wartime vote, even though many argue that Ukraine needs fresh faces in power.

“He chose to move on the populist trajectory, underlining the risks and challenges for democratic process of election,” said Lesia Bidochko, a policy fellow at the European Policy Institute in Kyiv. 

Zelenskiy has yet to respond directly to Fedorov’s call, but the president’s communications adviser Dmytro Lytvyn told reporters that: “Russia’s daily drone and missile strikes are the exhaustive answer to this ‌question”.

In his statement late ‌on Tuesday, Fedorov said the country ⁠faced a crisis of governance and that Ukraine’s democratic process “cannot be held hostage by Russia”.

Wartime elections are prohibited under law. 

An August 5 poll by the ​Kyiv International Institute of Sociology showed 57 per cent of Ukrainians believe they should only take place after the war, given that hundreds of thousands of troops are on the front line and Russian missiles and drones are raining down on Ukrainian cities, towns and villages.

“We must find a legal, safe and realistic mechanism that will allow Ukraine to renew its full democratic process even in the conditions of a long war,” said Fedorov.

He did not say whether he would compete in any election, but another recent poll indicated the tech-savvy Fedorov – Zelenskiy’s longest-standing ally – would comfortably beat his former boss in a runoff vote.

Bidochko said there was still no realistic procedure for organising a vote, with millions of Ukrainians living as refugees overseas, displaced within the country, and ⁠serving in the military.

“Currently, it looks like an elegant way of occupying the opposition space without taking responsibility for the mechanics,” she said.

Opinion on the streets ​and online was mixed on Wednesday.

South Korea will flag off, this weekend, a container ship bound for Europe via ‌the Arctic, testing whether a route opened by melting sea ice can be commercially viable, but risking friction with Western allies, as the voyage requires Russian cooperation.

If successful, the trip would ‌be South Korea’s first such commercial voyage to Europe via the Arctic, placing it with China and Russia among the few countries whose shipping firms have tested or run cargo services along the ‌route. 

Sailing north from the port of Busan, the PanStar Acro will make stops at Felixstowe in Britain, Rotterdam in the Netherlands and Poland’s Gdansk before returning in a journey expected to take 40 to 45 days, its operator PanStar said. 

“Around September, when this voyage will mainly take place, Arctic sea ice is at its lowest level of the year, making safer navigation possible,” an official of the group said on condition of anonymity.

President Lee Jae Myung has made Arctic shipping a priority, with officials ‌saying it could help ‌transform the southeastern port of ⁠Busan into a global maritime hub and position the Arctic as a regular trade route by 2030.

Western diplomats, however, are unhappy with the plan, as it has required Seoul to consult Russia and seek permits for the ship’s voyage.

“We want to isolate Russia, we don’t want engagement with Russia,” said one European diplomat, citing Russia’s war in Ukraine, and adding that the concerns had been voiced to South Korean officials. 

Arctic shipping experts also said South Korea could be at risk of breaching sanctions if the ship sought Russia’s help to tackle problems encountered on the route, such as getting stuck in ice. 

South Korea’s Oceans Ministry and Russia’s Foreign Ministry did not respond ⁠to requests for comment.

The faster melting of Arctic ‌sea ice, attributed to ​global warming, has made it more feasible this summer to try out the Northern Sea Route, as it is known. 

As traffic on the route grows, Norwegian tracking foundation the Centre for ​High North Logistics ‌said 88 vessels made 103 transits through the Northern Sea Route last year, up from 97 in 2024 and 43 in 2022, chiefly from nations such as Russia and China.

South ​Korea’s Oceans Ministry said the Arctic route could shorten voyages by up to 35 per cent over the traditional Suez Canal route, and require less fuel. 

But commercial feasibility could be harder to assess.

Unit transport costs for the Arctic route are swelled by factors such as vessel size limits and insurance costs, former naval officer Hyewon Choi, said ​in ​a study published last year in the journal Ocean Policy Research.

“We cannot ​use the Northern Sea Route year-round,” he told Reuters, adding that the route is only navigable ‌by container vessels during the three summer months when the ice melts. 

PanStar, picked in a government-backed tender for the pilot voyage, bought a 2700 Twenty-Foot Equivalent Unit container ship from HMM that it is modifying for polar navigation, with a crew of 20 Koreans and Indonesians.

The company told Reuters it is seeking at least 1300 Twenty-Foot Equivalent Unit of cargo such as car parts, food and cosmetics, along with shipments from China and Japan, with clients from the latter expressing interest.

China is already trying to secure first-mover advantage on the route, making a South Korean voyage ​more urgent, the PanStar official said.

“Korea must begin accumulating operating experience and data that it has not had until now, if the national goal of commercial scheduled service by 2030 ​is to be achievable.” 

Chinese container company Sea ⁠Legend Shipping plans to launch the first regular container service to Europe via the Northern Sea Route, the route’s Russian operator says.

Aldi has suffered another copyright infringement loss over its range of toddler snacks resembling a brand-name competitor.

The discount supermarket giant known for its products mimicking the big brands redesigned its Mamia range packaging in 2018, instructing an agency to use the Little Bellies brand as the benchmark for the new designs.

The Mamia range went on sale in 2021 featuring a blue cartoon owl smiling above images of the food.

That triggered a legal letter from Hampden Holdings, whose Little Bellies and Mighty Bellies feature a similar-looking orange creature above images of food.

Subsequent changes Aldi made to its branding failed to satisfy Hampden, which launched a lawsuit in 2022.

A designer behind the Bellies designs testified about the process of designing the packaging, including the decision to make it primarily white to appeal to the target audience of “millennial mothers”.

The Federal Court in 2024 found three products infringed the Baby Bellies copyright but ruled eight others in the Mamia range had not.

Justice Mark Moshinsky described the three infringements as “flagrant” and said Aldi, despite intending to not infringe, had taken a risk that its use of the Bellies designs would exceed what the law allows.

Additional damages were awarded because Aldi continued to sell the products despite legal warnings.

The result served as a blow to Aldi, which once used the slogan “like brands, only cheaper” and has historically managed to avoid claims of infringement by using sufficiently different product names.

Both sides appealed the decision, with Aldi challenging any product infringed copyright.

In a judgment published on Wednesday, two further Mamia products – Mamia Fruit and Oat Bars Apricot and MAMIA Fruit Snack Cereal Bars Apple, Blueberry and Banana – were also found in breach.

Aldi also failed to dislodge the finding it was liable for additional damages.

In the case of the two companies’ blueberry puffs, the appeal judges found it was apparent the Aldi packaging appropriated numerous aspects of the Hampden packaging.

The supermarket giant however won part of its appeal by demonstrating that the original judge did not apply the correct approach.

The original infringement findings about the puffs snacks were retained, but their scope narrowed with the court finding each Aldi product only infringed one Bellies product, not multiple.

“The present case is not an easy or clear-cut case,” the appeal judges wrote three times in their judgement.

The matter will now return to the primary judge to decide damages at a later date.

Before the appeal was heard, the primary judge had ordered Aldi to reveal how many of the impugned products it sold or supplied, and its profits from those sales.

Concern about inflation deepened at the Federal Reserve’s meeting last month, with several policymakers ready to raise interest rates and many saying a hike in borrowing costs would be needed ‌if inflation does not decline to the US central bank’s 2.0 per cent target, according to minutes.

The policymakers who favoured a rate increase at the meeting “remarked that ‌price pressures appeared broad-based and judged that the (policy-setting). Committee should adopt a more restrictive policy stance to meet its commitment to achieving its price-stability and maximum employment goals on a sustained basis,” the minutes of the July 28-29 meeting said. 

Failure to do so, they argued, would risk “a steeper and potentially more costly sequence of tightening moves at a later stage”. 

The Fed voted at that meeting to hold its benchmark interest rate in the current 3.50 per cent-3.75 per cent range, but with three policymakers dissenting in favour of a quarter-percentage point hike.

A larger ‌group of participants “assessed ‌that policy tightening would likely be ⁠necessary if inflation did not decline,” the minutes said.

The minutes, covering Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh’s second meeting as head ​of the central bank, showed central bankers already delving into some of the broader issues he wants to pursue as part of a possible overhaul of how the Fed operates.

Participants saw an upcoming task force review of how the Fed manages its balance sheet as an “opportunity for a comprehensive discussion”.

 However, many participants at the meeting “reaffirmed that the primary means of adjusting the stance of monetary policy should be through changes in the target range for the federal funds rate,” not manipulating the Fed’s asset holdings.

Warsh also asked for input from the committee ⁠on whether it would be better for the Fed to hold only six meetings a ‌year rather than the ​current eight, allowing for a full two months of data to accumulate each time. 

No decisions were made regarding this issue, the minutes said, and the 2026 schedule ​of meetings would not ‌be altered. 

The minutes drew little reaction in financial markets. 

An announcement earlier on Wednesday that the Treasury would double its buyback of longer-term US government debt had ​eased upward pressure on yields and helped lift stocks after Tuesday’s rout. 

Rate-futures markets continued to price better-than-even odds that the Fed will begin raising rates at its October 27-28 meeting and, failing that, a very high probability of a rate hike at its last meeting of the year in December.

There was ​no ​mention in the minutes of support for a rate cut, a sign ​of how the Fed’s policy debate has shifted over the course of a year ‌that began with an expectation that the central bank would be able to lower borrowing costs this year as inflation slowed. 

Price pressures, however, have continued to build, particularly after the Trump administration joined Israel in a war with Iran. 

Shipments of oil and gas through the strategic Strait of Hormuz continue to be constrained almost six months after the start of the conflict. 

The Fed is expected to hold its policy rate steady again at its September 15-16 meeting after recent data showed inflation easing slightly and firms unexpectedly shedding ​jobs in July. 

The data has left officials still divided over whether rate hikes will be needed to slow inflation further, but also more cautious about the strength ​of the labour market and the risks ⁠to their goal of maintaining full employment. 

Warsh has been reluctant to talk about the path of monetary policy on his ​watch.