Crude awakening
Jim Chalmers hoped a strong GDP print would dominate the day, but Iran conflict jitters rattled markets, pushed up oil and gold and revived rate hike fears.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers probably wanted to spend Wednesday morning spinning a stronger-than-expected GDP print to make the case the Labor government is managing the economy well.
Instead, reporters swamped him with questions about the Iran conflict, surging commodity prices and inflation, pushing him into the role of macro market strategist.
“You can see in other prices and indicators in our economy that already markets, including commodity markets, are reacting quite significantly to developments as we would expect that they would,” Chalmers told reporters, noting the recent spike in Brent crude and gold.
As he spoke, equity markets across the region were in a tailspin amid renewed jitters about the situation in the Middle East.
