Giving the power back to residents
Victorians who live in new apartments will soon have more choice when it comes to their electricity provider, as compulsory embedded networks will be banned in new apartments from 1 January 2023. Embedded networks are private electricity networks that serve multiple customer properties in a building or self-contained site like apartment blocks, retirement villages, social…
China’s new energy vehicle industry in growth fast lane
China’s new energy vehicle (NEV) industry has entered the fast lane of development, with both domestic and foreign carmakers vying for bigger shares of this rapidly expanding market. Despite the COVID-19 resurgence, China’s NEV industry continued to enjoy a market boom thanks to policy incentives and more choices of competitive models. From January to November,…
Sinopec completes record ultra-deep exploration drill
China’s largest petrochemical products supplier announced on Wednesday that it had achieved a record depth in its ultra-deep oil and natural gas drilling exploration efforts. The risk exploration well in southwest China’s Sichuan Basin registered a depth of 8,866 meters, according to China Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec). The landmark well is another example of progress made…
Partnership Opens Door To Home Ownership For Thousands
Victorians looking to buy a home have been encouraged to consider a government-backed scheme that has helped thousands of people by drastically reducing the up-front purchase costs. The Andrews Labor Government’s $1.6 billion Victorian Homebuyer Fund contributes up to 25 per cent of a home’s purchase price, reduces the required deposit to just five per…
US share markets on the rise
US share markets rose on Thursday after a rise in jobless claims suggested a softer job market, easing concerns about higher interest rates. The Dow Jones index rose 345 points or 1.1%. The S&P 500 rose 1.8%; the Nasdaq lifted 265 points or 2.6%. Originally published by CommSec
China to facilitate green technology innovation
China has released an implementation plan designed to further improve the market-oriented green technology innovation system, in order to unleash innovation vitality. The plan, jointly released by the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Science and Technology, aims to strengthen companies’ leading role in innovation, improve the market mechanism for transformation and…
90% of young people had financial troubles in 2022
Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) services have dramatically changed the landscape of personal lending, largely by being easy to access and not charging interest – thus avoiding national credit laws. In the 2021-22 financial year, according to data from the Reserve Bank of Australia, the number of active BNPL accounts in Australia rose from 5…
Mega solar, wind power project starts construction
A mega solar and wind power base kicked off construction in China’s seventh-largest desert on Wednesday. With an overall installed capacity of 16 million kW, the project is the world’s largest power generation base of its kind in desert areas. Located in the Kubuqi Desert in north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, the project will…
Year in review: The good, the bad and the ugly
Amid inflation and market turmoil, here’s what went wrong (and right) this year. Markets look set to close the year the way they spent most of it: volatile, fixated on central banks and worried about a recession. Even though the data released this week more or less confirmed that inflation in the United States is…
Outlook 2023, Global bonds: four reasons for optimism
It will be a tricky road ahead, but interesting opportunities are opening up as some of the pressures faced by bond markets are starting to ease. High inflation and an aggressive response by central banks led to a challenging 2022 and poor performance among many asset classes. However, there are a number of reasons why…
