The Dive | Business News

Over the last year, there’s been a drama unfolding in the headlines. Two war-ing factions who’ve been sledging each other in the courts and the media, there’s been allegations of betrayal, and hypocrisy, and most notably - huge amounts of money have changed hands. Then, just last week, almost as suddenly as it started… a truce was declared.   The scene for this melodrama isn’t reality TV...

A number of notable companies have been using carbon offsets to achieve climate goals.  I mean, the starting point here is that no company is truly carbon neutral. If you use computers, transport any physical goods or use electricity - you’ve got emissions. So, how do companies achieve carbon neutrality? They buy offsets. For each tonne of carbon emitted, they buy a credit that offsets their...

The last few weeks have been dominated with headlines around the PricewaterhouseCoopers tax scandal. The consulting firm have found themselves under fire over revelations some senior partners misused confidential information provided to them. They used this information to assist and seek other clients - telling them they could avoid paying more tax.  The company’s Australian CEO has quit, nin...

Apple launches are huge. When the company announces a new product - it's becomes both a technological and cultural touchpoint. Think about some of the big trends in years past - the iPod, the iPhone, Airpods! Cause when Apple tells us something is cool - we tend to believe them. This week, Apple revealed it was launching its first big product in over a decade. The anticipation was high. So, what’s...

We're back! Did you miss us? Today Alec and Sascha discuss a legal debacle involving a lawsuit against Colombian airline, Avianca. Plaintiff Roberto Mata claimed to be injured by a serving cart during a flight, but a brief presented by his lawyer, Steven Schwartz, created chaos. The brief, prepared with the assistance of ChatGPT - an AI program - cited several non-existent court cases. Schwartz ad...

Take your mind back about 18 months. The buzz word at the time in the tech world was the Metaverse. Investment was flowing. Any company that mentioned they were getting into the Metaverse was attracting attention. Facebook literally changed its name to Meta. But now... It's all come crashing back to earth. So... was the metaverse just a phase? Or is it like many other disruptive technologies...

What came as a shock to some of the people in the office - Tupperware is actually a brand - not just a plastic container. So when we heard last week that shares in Tupperware tumbled nearly 50 per cent and the company has revealed it engaged financial advisers to help it secure financing, we were intrigued. The company is in such dire straits it’s in danger of being delisted by the New York Stock...

You’re in the market for a new car. You’re a forward thinking, environmentally conscious individual, so you buy a brand new electric vehicle. It’s not a small amount of money you decide to part with either - the most affordable electric cars in Australia are still upwards of 45k. Luckily the Australian government is on your side - they introduced legislation last year to help knock a bit off the p...

A recent report from the International Monetary Fund has reached a stark conclusion for Australia: out of the 27 countries they analysed, Australia's housing market is the second riskiest. Tune in to today's episode of The Dive to hear Bryce and Ren unpack the IMF's findings and what it might mean for Australian homeowners. After that, Bryce and Ren unpack two more stories that caught their eye: S...

What’s the best animated film ever made?  There's a myriad of options… Frozen, Finding Nemo, Aladdin… The Lion King. But there’s one name now that tops them all: The Super Mario Bros Movie. It’s not been a critical success - but that hasn’t stopped the film being a juggernaut. It took in $377 million USD in its opening weekend in cinemas and broke the opening weekend record for two categories...

We all know we Australians are obsessed with a property story. It’s certainly been hard to avoid the resounding chorus of news reports about the housing crisis.   In fact we already covered this topic in an episode at the beginning of the year - forecasting this very situation - that the availability of homes would get a lot worse before there was any sense of relief. Lately there’s been...

Join Sascha and Darcy as they travel through three headlines that have them intrigued. Apparently, Twitter no longer exists, one million people are going to be given free vapes in the UK. Lastly - a pair of trainers were sold for $2.2 million dollars. But these aren't just any trainers, and their sale broke a record in this division.  Tell us what you think of The Dive - email us at thedive@e...

ChatGPT is one of the fastest growing applications in history. It has set off a frenzy of competitors trying to play catchup and release their own versions of generative AI. But the standout still is OpenAI’s ChatGPT, backed by Microsoft. But not everyone is a fan. ChatGPT has recently been banned in Italy, and it might not be the last country to do so. We’ve also seen Elon Musk and Apple Co-found...

Still catching your breath from Succession this week? If you’re joining us for the first time - welcome! This is the second episode of a two part series we’re releasing on The Dive. Last episode, Sascha spoke with Sarah Ellison - staff writer at The Washington Post - about the case beginning on the 17th April - Fox News v Dominion Voting Systems.  Closer to home, there’s another defamation ca...

Are you also obsessed with Succession? The HBO drama is the topic of choice around the office watercooler, and we can't get enough of the show loosely based on the Murdoch dynasty. At the same time this show is all over our television screens, the real life family are facing two very high profile court cases, on two different continents. One that's scheduled to take place at the end of the month i...

Social media has changed our lives. Armed only only a phone, we can FaceTime relatives around the world, see our friends travelling the world on Instagram, check someone’s location on Snapchat, and watch a highlight video of their trip on TikTok. But there’s a difference between being connected - and having meaningful interactions. We don’t often find that on social media. Now, a number of new stu...

TikTok is having a bit of a moment. Coinciding with its raging popularity, TikTok’s CEO has been facing a US congress hearing over security concerns stemming from its Chinese parent company, Bytedance. We’ve already seen countries like New Zealand, France and the UK banning TikTok from government devices. Yesterday, Australia also joined in banning the app from government devices. The US governmen...

It’s only been just over ten years since the American state of Colorado legalised recreational marijuana.  It felt like big news at the time, but now the world has seen a big push towards legalisation.  Uruguay followed in 2013, then Georgia, South Africa and Canada in 2018, Mexico and Malta in 2021 and most recently Thailand in 2022. In the United States, there's now 21 states that've l...

Today we’re tackling a controversial topic. Whether or not we should have Daylight Savings Time. It’s a common practice globally - but not everyone agrees.  Those who follow it, mostly love it. Those who don’t, seem to hate it. It’s so polarising that Lebanon actually split into two different time zones last week after the Government decided not to change the clocks but half the country did i...

Afterpay - is the definition of a recent Aussie success story. The buy-now-pay-later service that catapulted to the front of the pack when that wave of services came through a couple of years ago. And if you’re on financial media - like we are - you’re always encountering the headline - which stock is the next Afterpay? Reminding us of what a golden run it had during the pandemic. The company was...

Today, we’re trying something a little different. You’re used to Sascha introducing one story that we’ll talk about for the next fifteen or so minutes, but today we want to tackle three. There's no reason why, we just really like these stories... but honestly, we didn’t quite think there was quite enough to pump out a full episode. So we just thought - why not talk about them together! So here we...

A million people have taken to the streets in France. Why? Because the Government has forced through a new law increasing the pension age from 62 to 64. The move from President Emmanuel Macron has not been popular. Two thirds of the French population disagree with the change. It’s seen his popularity plummet to just 28%.  But Macron says - this is a change that had to be done and he’s not the...

The global banking system is under some extreme stress. Over the past few weeks, three U.S. banks have failed. And Swiss bank Credit Suisse has been acquired by its biggest rival after it also ran into trouble.  It's natural to be worried. Is this the start of a run on the banks? A financial crisis? Or is this a lot of media hype? Most importantly, when it comes to American banks on the other...

Recently, it was revealed that The Mormon Church - aka Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints - had a secret $100 billion investment portfolio.  That headline caught our attention, because it sparked so many questions: How do you keep $100 billion dollars a secret? Why did it need to be secret in the first place? How does the church amass so much money? Do all churches have that muc...

Apple has been secretly working on a revolutionary healthcare project for years. One they started when Steve Jobs was still CEO.  Here's a clue about what it involves... Did you know 11.5% of global health expenditure is spent on diabetes? That’s USD$966 billion! Roughly 1 in 10 Americans are diabetic - in Australia, it is roughly 1 in 20.  Every day, most diabetics prick their skin to t...