Rolled gold burritos, AI mania and ‘the mother of all bubbles’ were big business in 2024

And we end the year still wondering if casino operator Star Entertainment Group will join the casualty list after cycling through an investigation into whether it is fit to hold a casino licence (it still isn’t), a new CEO and board.

Star remains teetering on the brink of collapse with both investors and lenders reluctant to help deal with the cash crunch that has taken hold, as consumer spending at its casinos drops while regulatory costs and other expenses soar.

Greed is not good

Interestingly, companies that had no trouble turning a quid were finding themselves in hot water.

This scrutiny kicked off in February with a union-backed inquiry into price gouging produced by former competition watchdog head Allan Fels. It found that Australians are paying too much for everything from airline seats and energy prices to groceries and childcare.

“Australians are paying prices too high too often, and the cause is weak and ineffective competition,” Fels said in an address to the National Press Club.

Retailers such as Coles and Woolworths were called to give evidence in Canberra as politicians joined the price gouging fury, as prices and interest rates gave voters no relief.

It led to the lament from Michael Chaney, the chairman of Bunnings owner Wesfarmers, to investors at last month’s AGM that there were “outsiders” for whom “profit seems to be a dirty word”.

He expounded on how important profits were for government taxes and shareholders and, as it happens, Mrs Chaney. She is apparently the direct hold of the Chaneys’ multimillion-dollar Wesfarmers stake, which was slashed just weeks ago when they sold more than $2.8 million worth of stock – their first sale in more than seven years – for “financial planning” purposes.

In August, it was Qantas boss Vanessa Hudson defending the once-iconic airline’s $1.25 billion profit by saying: “We have to maintain a certain level of profitability because that’s core to us being able to renew the fleet and at the heart of what is good for customers and our people.”

That profitability also helped with the $120 million payout to 1700 illegally sacked workers that Qantas this month agreed to pay – after exhausting every legal avenue for appeal over four long years. The airline had already reached a $120 million settlement with the competition watchdog recently over “ghost flights”, its practice of advertising and selling tickets on already cancelled flights to tens of thousands of consumers.

The backlash did not prevent Qantas shares from soaring to record highs. The stock has more than doubled since July last year when a record profit, and furore over poor customer service, triggered the early departure of Alan Joyce, Hudson’s predecessor.

Richard Goyder also departed as chairman before Qantas’ AGM last month. An internal report determined Goyder and the board were asleep at the wheel as Joyce waged war with customers, employees and regulators.

Bad boys for life

Even before Donald Trump won a return to the White House, ASX investors had signalled strongly that money wins over moral concerns.

Nothing exemplified this better than the founding fathers of WiseTech and Mineral Resources – Richard White and Chris Ellison, respectively – closely followed by Super Retail’s prized chief executive, Anthony Heraghty.

Allegations against all three men remain just that – allegations – but the interesting bit was how the market clearly signalled more concern over any potential disconnection between the key men and the companies they ran.

WiseTech shares hit record highs, as did Super Retail shares, despite the allegations, but Mineral Resources stock imploded at the thought of life without Ellison.

White’s ill-judged decision to try to bankrupt a former lover in October was settled within weeks, but not before a joint investigation by The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and The Australian Financial Review aired allegations about his dealings with other female entrepreneurs and bullying.

White stepped down as CEO but remains in a powerful consulting role at the group, which subsequently cleared him of bullying and inappropriate conduct allegations.

The board has assured investors that White is not going anywhere and noted his “direct approach” was consistent with the process of “creative abrasion”, which created value for the $40 billion organisation.

Mineral Resources investors also wobbled following allegations Ellison had involved the company in some overly innovative tax practises which were to his benefit, and also used company employees to do his personal work, such as maintaining his luxury boat.

In a brief statement at the miner’s AGM last month, Ellison told shareholders he made an “error of judgment” in failing to report his personal tax issues and expressed regret for the impact on the business and its staff.

Meanwhile, Super Retail got into a bruising legal battle against its former top two lawyers over explosive allegations implicating senior executives and its now departed chair, Sally Pitkin. The company insists the allegations are not true and are nothing to concern investors.

Investors were happy to follow this advice and sent Super Retail stock to record highs following its full-year results in August.

The media muddle

The media industry demonstrated it is still capable of producing quality Australian drama – just not the sort it wanted in front of viewers.

Kim Williams has been making waves as chair at the ABC, where prominent radio personalities are being shown the door, while Kyle and Jackie O’s push into the Melbourne radio market has been memorable for all the wrong reasons.

But nothing quite cuts the mustard like the Murdochs’ Succession-style masterpiece.

In a remarkable case of life imitating art, imitating life, it appears the Murdoch rebel siblings – Elisabeth, Prudence and James – took note of a Succession episode in April last year, when patriarch Logan Roy dies, and leaves the family business in tumult.

The hit TV series inspired by the Murdochs, apparently inspired the real Murdochs to try to openly discuss what would happen with the passing of their own patriarch, Rupert, which would leave his four eldest children, including favoured successor Lachlan, with equal say.

It went so badly that Rupert and Lachlan unsuccessfully tried to tamper with the family trust and ensure Lachlan retained effective control of the family’s controlling stake in Fox and News Corp, rather than share with his siblings.

We can only guess what’s in store at the Murdoch Christmas lunch.

Also, we couldn’t forget the salacious allegations of wrongdoing in television land at the Nine Network – the owner of this masthead – as well as Kerry Stokes’ Seven Network.

Taylor Auerbach, a former producer on Seven’s Spotlight program, told the Federal Court he and Bruce Lehrmann – “arguably Australia’s most hated man”, according to Lehrmann’s own lawyer – paid for Thai sex workers and drugs one fateful night in late 2022.

Auerbach said the expenses were part of a campaign to woo Lehrmann, the former Liberal staffer accused of raping then-colleague Brittany Higgins, to appear on Spotlight, which explains why Seven apparently reimbursed the expenses. Lehrmann has denied the rape allegations.

Lehrmann this year lost his multimillion-dollar defamation suit against the Ten Network and presenter Lisa Wilkinson over an interview with Higgins aired on The Project in February 2021.

In April, Federal Court Justice Michael Lee found that on the balance of probabilities, Lehrmann had raped Higgins in Parliament House in 2019. Lehrmann is appealing against those findings. Lehrmann’s involvement with Seven triggered a string of departures from the network, which also had to clean out 150 staff due to a dire media market.

In a separate controversy, Seven sacked one of its most senior and prominent journalists, Robert Ovadia, over allegations of “inappropriate behaviour”.

Meanwhile, Nine boss Mike Sneesby stepped down amid allegations of bullying and bad behaviour in the network’s television business. The allegations pre-dated Sneesby’s tenure.

In May, this masthead reported Darren Wick – who left his role as Nine’s high-profile news and current affairs – had engaged in drunken, lecherous behaviour in what furious staff say was “an open secret” at the television network for more than a decade.

Sneesby did not help matters by flying to Paris for Nine’s Olympic coverage in July, staying in top hotels, and carrying the Olympic torch, while staff at this masthead were about to go on strike over a pay deal. Nine also made job cuts across its media empire.

In October, after Sneesby’s departure, a cultural review of the company found belittlement, public white-anting and the abuse of power were commonplace in Nine’s broadcast news division, and that leaders lacked accountability and often made decisions based on status, relationships or self-interest.

China crisis

The Australian sharemarket’s record highs defied a hangover from our largest trading partner, China, which has been the main contributor to Australia’s soaring fortunes over the past two decades.

Our big miners did their bit by attempting to diversify away from iron ore, but it is not easy given they exported $115 billion worth of the stuff to China in 2023.

BHP’s $US49 billion offer for Anglo American fell over, and its decision to shutter Nickel West in the face of falling prices says plenty about how diversification plans are working out.

Andrew Forrest’s plans to make his iron ore miner, Fortescue, a green hydrogen superpower also ran into trouble with the billionaire among those hitting the pause button on their plans.

Bank on controversy

Our big banks looked like they would finally make it through a year without dominating the headlines until the Commonwealth Bank made the controversial decision to charge customers for accessing their own money.

“We’ve done a poor job of communicating aspects of this change for our customers,” a spokesman said after the bank copped a battering from Canberra and customers.

ANZ waited until last week to cap off its torrid year. As one shareholder put it at the bank’s AGM last week: “In heaven’s name, can someone tell us what the hell is going on?”

Investors delivered a strike against ANZ’s remuneration report – despite departing chief Shayne Elliott sacrificing another $3 million in bonuses – over allegations of bad behaviour on its trading floor and market manipulation of government bond sales that may have dudded taxpayers.

Elliott has insisted that “based on what we’ve seen, we don’t see anything wrong”.

Of course, with Trump about to return to the White House – and one Bitcoin surging above the $US100,000 mark – many investors will wonder why they should bother keeping up with the tumult in the local corporate scene.

‘Thoroughly dominating the mind space of global investors, America is over-owned, overvalued, and overhyped to a degree never seen before.’

Rockefeller International chair Ruchir Sharma

An influential column by Ruchir Sharma, chair of Rockefeller International, ominously titled “The mother of all bubbles” might give pause for thought.

“Talk of bubbles in tech or AI, or in investment strategies focused on growth and momentum, obscures the mother of all bubbles in US markets,” Sharma wrote in the Financial Times this month.

“Thoroughly dominating the mind space of global investors, America is over-owned, overvalued, and overhyped to a degree never seen before.”

We can’t wait for 2025.