Albanese gets Trump support on AUKUS, rare earths deal, despite Rudd clash

Good morning. Here's what happened overnight and what you need to know today.

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1.

Rare signing: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and US President Donald Trump signed a critical minerals deal at the White House which Albanese said represents a USD8.5 billion pipeline “ready to go.” Each country will contribute USD1 billion over the next six months to projects ready to proceed, Albanese said. He outlined three project types: joint ventures like Alcoa, US-led investments including processing, and Australian-led projects, one also involving Japan. Albanese praised Trump’s role in the recent Israel-Hamas ceasefire and invited the president to visit Australia. Trump said he would give it serious consideration and described Albanese as “a friend”. He also offered his strongest public backing yet for AUKUS, easing concerns over the pact’s future and signalling the US would now move “full steam ahead” on delivering nuclear submarines to Australia. In an uncomfortable moment, a reporter asked Trump about concerns over Australia’s stance on Palestine, climate policy and past criticism from ambassador Kevin Rudd, prompting him to tell Rudd, “Well I don’t like you either. And I probably never will.” (Capital Brief)(The White House)(SMH)(Reuters)

2.

AWS down: Amazon Web Services struggled to recover from a widespread outage that disrupted thousands of websites and services globally, including financial platforms, airlines, government agencies and Amazon’s own products. AWS is the tech giant's cloud computing division, and its infrastructure underpins millions of large companies' websites and platforms. The issue began when a key AWS database update went wrong, preventing software from connecting to the systems it needed and causing failures across at least 113 services. AWS later said problems inside its own systems were also slowing efforts to get services back online. Despite saying it had “fully mitigated” the initial issue, Amazon acknowledged ongoing API errors and connectivity problems. Downdetector recorded over 6.5 million global outage reports. Impacted platforms included Coinbase, Robinhood, Reddit, Pinterest, Snapchat, Delta, United Airlines, HMRC and Alexa. (Capital Brief)(AWS)(Downdetector)

3.

Rally return: Wall Street climbed as traders responded to stronger-than-expected earnings and signs of cooling US-China tariff tensions, with the S&P 500 trading 1.2% higher in late afternoon and on track for its best two-day advance since June. About 85% of companies reporting so far have beaten profit forecasts, according to Bloomberg. Apple rose to a 2025 high after Loop Capital upgraded the stock to buy, citing iPhone demand. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index also reached a record. During his lunch press briefing with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Donald Trump reiterated his threat to raise tariffs on Chinese goods if there isn’t a deal by 1 November. However, he stressed plans to meet President Xi Jinping next week, while suggesting tariffs could ease if China resumes agricultural purchases. Meanwhile, National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett told CNBC the 20-day US government shutdown is “likely to end sometime this week”, citing signals from Senate Democrats, though he did not provide further detail. (Bloomberg)(Reuters)(WSJ)

4.

Juicy Apple: Apple booked close to $13 billion in Australian revenue off the back of growth in its local services business, as the iPhone maker looks to stoke rising demand in emerging markets. Documents filed with ASIC on Friday also show Apple’s Australian subsidiary reported net profit after tax of $441 million for the 2025 financial year, up 5.5% on the $418.2 million posted the previous year. Revenue for the year was $12.96 billion, up 5.6% on the $12.27 billion booked in 2024. The numbers imply a pretax profit margin for Apple of less than 5% in Australia, compared to about 43% globally according to numbers in its most recent quarterly results. Apple’s Australian subsidiary returned $401.6 million in dividends to its immediate parent company in Ireland, Apple Operations International Limited, and paid $188 million in tax. The news came as shares in Apple hit a record high on Monday. (Capital Brief)

5.

Record purchase: Software group RecordPoint acquired Blackbird-backed Redactive, a Melbourne-based security startup which helps companies manage new data threats posed by AI. Co-founded by former Atlassian product managers, Redactive’s developer platform lets engineers and data governance teams set guardrails for new AI tools like agents and copilots as they are rolled out. RecordPoint said the move bolsters its AI capabilities as it looks to better serve its clients that range from big four banks to federal regulators. Financial terms were not disclosed. The acquisition will see RecordPoint’s bluechip clientele begin to use Redactive’s AI tool, including Westpac, NAB, Macquarie, prudential and securities regulators in Australia and the City of New York in the US. Redactive has raised $19 million in venture capital, including an $11.5 million seed round announced last year since it launched in September 2023. Blackbird, Zapier, Felicis Ventures and Atlassian’s venture arm are all investors in Redactive. (Capital Brief)

6.

Sudan blow: BNP Paribas shares slumped more than 10% on Monday to a six-month low after a New York federal jury found the bank liable to pay USD20.75 million ($31.9 million) in civil damages to three Sudanese refugees. The plaintiffs alleged BNP facilitated transactions for Sudan’s government between 2002 and 2008, enabling ethnic cleansing, displacement and mass killings under Omar al-Bashir, according to their lawyers. The case, described as a bellwether trial, is part of a broader class action involving more than 20,000 Sudanese refugees, law firm Hausfeld said. BNP Paribas said in a statement it “strongly believes this verdict should be overturned on appeal” and that it was “clearly wrong,” arguing the jury was not allowed to hear key evidence. The bank said the decision applies only to the three plaintiffs and any attempt to extrapolate the outcome is “necessarily wrong.” Bloomberg Intelligence estimated the bank could face a possible settlement of up to USD10 billion. (WSJ)(Bloomberg)(Hausfeld)

7.

Photo contest: The UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said on Monday that the proposed USD3.7 billion ($5.68 billion) merger between Getty Images and stock-photo rival Shutterstock raises competition concerns. The CMA said that the merger would “result in a substantial lessening of competition within a market or markets” in the UK. As a result, the merger will be referred for an in-depth, phase 2 investigation unless the parties address these competition concerns by 27 October. The watchdog noted that GenAI players are not currently, or will imminently be an alternative to stock content, and that there are barriers to the adoption of GenAI images, meaning that the merged company would not face competition from GenAI players. The news comes as the CMA waved through WorldPay’s USD24.3 billion deal with Global Payments to create a payment processing giant, finding that the deal will not weaken competition in the UK. (Capital Brief)(CMA)(Bloomberg)(WSJ)

8.

Barnaby’s choice: Nationals insiders believe Barnaby Joyce’s potential defection to One Nation proves a move against leader David Littleproud has fizzled out, while leaks over his move had added another layer of intrigue to the partyroom. Three MPs from the junior Coalition partner told Capital Brief that Joyce’s likely departure from Nationals demonstrated that attempts to oust Littleproud had ultimately failed. The former Nationals leader has stopped short of committing to joining One Nation, describing himself as a “free agent” who would mull his next move “slowly”. Two of the MPs added that a leak of the potential move had caught Joyce off guard, robbing him of the element of surprise. The leak, which was reported on by the Nine newspapers, had reduced the chances of Joyce actually joining Hanson’s far-right party, the MPs said, but both accepted the defection remained a likelihood. (Capital Brief)