One money story I’m keeping an eye on this week: the sharp rise in the price of bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies.

Yep, it hasn’t been the subject of headlines for a while, but bitcoin has seen a week of steady rises to its 2026 peak, as investors’ concerns around the stability of more traditional investment markets grow. It’s still a fair way of the record highs of October 2025, but as the global economy enters what experts say is a tumultuous end to 2026, you might just see more crypto chat in your news.

The quote: “Our members are still turning up to look after passengers, but they won’t be collecting extra fees on Jetstar’s behalf until Jetstar shows that it is serious about its workforce.”
The Australian Services Union national assistant secretary Scott Cowen, announcing Jetstar staff will not charge customers a range of fees today, as part of a push for better pay and conditions for its workers.

The stat: 725.5. The size (in hectares) of Anthropic’s first ever Australian data centre, announced by Queensland Premier David Crisafulli last week. That’s about 1,000 soccer fields.

The graph:

The ASX 200 tracks the 200 largest companies listed on the Australian share market. In the past month, the ASX 200 has fallen by 3.8%. The decrease was due to increased interest rate hike expectations and higher oil prices from the conflict in the Middle East. The slight increase in the past week was primarily driven by higher commodity prices strengthening mining and energy stocks.

Last week, the Federal Government unveiled its immigration policy plan, which includes cutting net overseas migration by nearly 70,000 people a year by 2028.

Migration is closely linked to Australia’s economy, and the new plan could affect you in ways you might not expect — from housing and prices to economic growth. But before we dive into what it could mean for you, here’s a quick look at what’s changing.

Net overseas migration (NOM) is broadly the number of people who arrive and stay in Australia for at least 12 months less the number of people who leave and stay away for at least 12 months (the Australian Bureau of Statistics uses a 12-in-16-month residency rule). This figure is used to calculate Australia’s population change due to migration.

In the year ending 31 March 2026, NOM was 292,100. The Commonwealth Budget released in May forecasts this figure to fall to 245,000 in 2026-27 and 225,000 in 2027-28. Last week, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke announced the plan to help achieve those forecasts.

The plan introduces a ballot system for second and third year working holiday visas, cutting places to 45,000 and 5,000 respectively. It generally bars international students from bringing family members, restricts course switching, and redirects skilled-migration processing priority to construction, healthcare, agriculture, fisheries and teaching.

According to the most recent population data, Australia’s population grew by 392,700 in the past year. NOM accounts for about three-quarters of that growth, while the natural increase (births minus deaths) was 100,600.

Assuming the natural increase remains the same and NOM falls to 225,000, Australia’s population growth would be 325,600 people. This would be the slowest since 2011, excluding the 2020-2022 COVID disruption.

Gross domestic product (GDP) is the total value of goods and services produced in an economy.

In theory, the slowdown in NOM should weigh on Australia’s GDP growth rate. A country’s population is one of the core drivers of potential GDP — the amount of output an economy can produce when its resources are fully employed.

If population growth slows, that means fewer additional workers available, which slows the growth of economic output. On the demand side, there are also fewer consumers to buy things such as food, clothing, or accommodation.

While the Commonwealth Budget forecasts Australia’s GDP growth to slow in 2026-27, the Government mainly attributes this to the conflict in the Middle East, higher global oil prices and the resulting inflationary pressures, rather than migration.

A possible reason why the reduction in NOM is not a primary driver of GDP is that the Government is focusing on migrants who contribute more to the economy, for example tradespeople and resource workers. This could partly offset the slowing in population growth.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) called it “a fairly reasonable” plan and a “steady, responsible” approach. Earlier in the week, the ACCI had warned that One Nation’s migration policy would “run the risk of putting Australia into a deep recession”.

However, the ACCI said the Government’s changes to working holiday visas would reduce the number of workers available and ultimately hurt businesses, a concern echoed by the National Farmers’ Federation, Accommodation Australia and the Australian Hotels Association. The latter two bodies said targeting working holiday makers “makes no logical sense” given chronic hospitality workforce shortages.

The changes were welcomed by the Housing Industry Association, which said prioritising skilled tradespeople was essential to increasing Australia’s housing supply. The Minerals Council of Australia also backed the migration policy and the priority given to skilled resource workers.

Reporting by Adam Wan.

If you haven’t been paying attention to the bond market, you’re missing out. It’s one of the biggest stories in finance at the moment.

Last week, returns to U.S. bonds reached 5.04%. For context, this is the highest they’ve been since July 2007, before the Global Financial Crisis.

Around the world, in countries like Australia and the UK, borrowing costs have seen a similar surge in the past year.

What exactly is happening, and how might it impact you?

Bonds are tools used by governments and companies to borrow money.

Let’s say a government wants to borrow $1,000 from you and will pay you back in 10 years. They’ll give you $30 every year as payment, meaning the return (or “yield”) of this 10-year bond is 3%.

Now, let’s say you want to sell this bond to another investor, but you’re having trouble finding a buyer. When you do manage to find a buyer, they only pay $750 for the bond. The bond still pays $30 a year (and gives back the $1,000 after 10 years), but under the new price, the yield is now 4%.

In this example, the bond yield rose (or “spiked”) from 3% to 4%. Bond prices and bond yields have an inverse relationship — when one goes up, the other goes down. When bond yields spike, it generally means there aren’t enough investors willing to buy the bonds at their old prices.

What would cause investors to stop buying? Before we answer that, let’s see what happened in the real world.

Yields of 10-year bonds are used as the benchmark for the borrowing costs of an economy.

Over the past year, bond yields in most developed countries have been rising. Last week, U.S. bond yields reached 5.04%. This was the highest yield since before the GFC.

Generally, the reasons why there aren’t enough investors willing to buy them at their old prices are because:

Market analysts point to several factors that have caused the rising bond yields.

If bonds are giving investors higher returns, banks increase their own rates to remain competitive. These increased rates are then passed onto you.

If you’re looking to borrow, such as for a car or a house, this means that rising yields will decrease your borrowing capacity. If you currently have a loan on a variable interest rate, the increased rates will increase your repayments. On the flip side, if you have a savings account, your monthly earnings will also increase.

If you invest in the stock market, rising yields generally lower stock market returns. This is because higher yields could draw investors away from stocks, decreasing their prices.

Higher yields don’t just affect you. Governments and companies looking to borrow also face higher costs, which means economies won’t be able to grow as fast — which, in many ways, still ends up affecting you.

Reporting by Adam Wan.

If everyone's feeling the squeeze, where's all this inflation coming from?

Plenty of households are feeling the squeeze - but prices are still rising faster than the RBA wants. Rent, power and groceries are all playing a part.

And the squeeze isn't landing evenly: one age group is spending more than ever.

If you’ve heard of FISHBOWL, get ready for this - bowl: THISBOWL.

Yes, the popular Australian poke bowl chain has just rebranded to THISBOWL.

Founded in Bondi in 2016, THISBOWL originally served kingfish, salmon, and tuna bowls. 10 years on, the restaurants now offer “a menu that goes far beyond fish”.

“THISBOWL is the sum of everything we love and believe in -- food, design, music, movement, art, fashion and culture,” said the co-founders.