1. Another lockdown-induced recession?

One major bank’s economics team thinks Australia could be in a recession, and they blame the Delta variant lockdowns. Before the Delta strain, another recession looked unthinkable, but equally unthinkable was Sydney in a six-week lockdown and Melbourne in another one. So NAB economists think we could already be in a recession! A recession is two quarters of negative growth, and the current September quarter has to be negative because of the lockdowns. The NAB team thinks the June quarter could be a small negative. If they’re right, their recession call could be right too. Let’s hope not because recession headlines are bad for confidence and jobs.

2. Could recession talk hurt the stock market?

It won’t be a positive for stocks, but, on the other hand, company reporting season starts in earnest this week, with CBA, NAB, Telstra, JB Hi-Fi and other big-name businesses set to do a show-and-tell of their profits. Profits are expected to be up a massive 50% but it will be the outlook statements that the market will watch closely. If they’re positive, stock prices will go higher.

3. “Computer says NO” to loans!

Getting a loan from a bank could soon get harder, with the regulator worried about big home loan borrowing rates. APRA oversees bank lending and recently told the country’s biggest lenders to avoid being reckless with their loans. Home loans are up a huge 83% in a year. Investor loans are up 40% since January. And the last time house prices fell (2017 to 2019), it was when APRA told banks to play hardball on lending.

4. Australia finishes sixth in Tokyo Olympics medal tally

With 17 gold, seven silver and 22 bronze medals, Australia has ranked sixth on the Tokyo Olympics medal tally after the games came to a close yesterday. The United States topped the medal table with 39 golds, just ahead of China on 38. Host country Japan came third with 27 golds, followed by Great Britain on 22 and the Russian Olympic Committee on 20.

5. Dow and S&P at record highs

Both the Dow Jones and the S&P 500 reached record-high closes on Friday. For the week, the Dow was up 0.78% to 35,208.51, the S&P moved 0.94% higher to 4,436.52 and the Nasdaq gained 1.11% to 14,835.76.