Jeor

Well Australia losing 8/28 hurts all the more because they were actually in a fairly strong position, leading by 60 with 9 wickets in hand and batting first. Shows how it can all turn on a dime in India. One of the big contrasts is the strength in each side's tail. India have batting strength all the way down but for Australia, Cummins at 8 is at least one position too high (Test batting average a touch under 16) and then Murphy, Lyon and Kuhnemann could all be interchangeable as No. 10s. None of them are quite the bunnies of a Number 11 spot but they're not going to produce many runs. Contrast this to Lee, Starc, Johnson who all had 20+ averages, supplemented by dour grinders like Gillespie who could hang in there.

When you have a guy with 5 Test centuries (Ashwin) coming in at Number 9, 7/150 really isn't what it seems!

Australia's 263 looking like a par score having bowled out India for 262. Looks like a one-innings shootout now, and Australia will feel pretty good about that batting first and now 1/50. Head scoring some quick runs - a mystery as to why he was left out of the First Test given his imperious Test form over the summer against South Africa, scoring at Gilchristian strike rates. It must be one of the first times that Australia have selected three frontline spinners as well. I'm not sure that was the right call given they only have Cummins for pace (all-rounder Green is still out) but I guess it was hard to decide who to leave out of Lyon/Murphy and they wanted the variation of the leftie Kuhnemann.

It's a common political playbook. In Australia, Labor is pretty much the same playbook. Policies and government much the same as the Coalition but they promise to be nicer and more competent about it. It's a tried and tested line, which I reckon started in the UK with Tony Blair and New Labour. He basically said, "This Conservative government is old and tired, we'll do a better job" and basically ran the most centrist (or right-wing to diehards) Labour government they'd ever seen. Mind you, by all accounts he did invest a lot in education and healthcare. But Blair basically did what the Conservatives should have evolved into.

Great debut by Murphy, but that's probably the only bright spot for Australia. The batting was horrendous (Smith aside) and the bowling, Murphy excepted, was not threatening enough. A very one sided contest that was over quickly. India won't been to change anything but I suspect they're going to be watching lots of video analysis of Murphy in the coming days...

Murphy bowling well now, but advantage India having bowled out Australia quite cheaply. Smith and Labuschagne top scoring is not a surprise - it seems like that's been how it is for the past three years. The surprise is that neither of them went on, but I feel both have a pretty good technique for the subcontinent and they'll be the most likely big scorers. The Aussie side really suffers from Cameron Green's absence. Without him they don't have a third seamer when they go for another spinner. At the same time, Handscomb is probably a better player of spin than Green, so I wonder if Renshaw will be the one to go when Green comes back in.

Lots of comments about the upcoming pitch for the First Test between Australia-India. Lyon aside, Australia's spin options aren't great. I really have no idea what this Test series will bring, India would be the favourites but there are so many question marks around how Australia's batting and bowling will perform (and conversely how India's batting and bowling will do taking on the Aussies). Hopefully it's a good series.

I think unemployment will stay relatively manageable, with the bulk of rate-rising done and likely a more pedestrian path for the next year. The geopolitical stuff is what worries me the most, and there's no way to anticipate it - and some of it will happen quickly. There are four main ones now that I think of it: 1. US government shutdown and default in Treasuries - I think this is almost certain to happen, unless moderate Republicans and Democrats join together to force something past. This may be a cataclysmic financial event. 2. Japanese bond market - the first interest rate rises in the Japanese market may be coming. This is going to be chaotic for the government. Not only do they have massive amounts of debt (260% of GDP) which will be much harder to service with higher rates, which will almost certainly cause a massive austerity budget and economic pain, but Japan is a huge creditor as the highest holder of US Treasuries, not to mention large holdings of other government bonds (such as Euros). If, say, the Japanese bonds start becoming competitive to the ECB bonds and some repatriation of money occurs, that could spell trouble. 3. European debt crisis - in a world of rising rates, the ECB is going to have trouble managing the differences between north and south. Italy in particular is always watched as the country most likely to blow up and the ECB are headed for a fair few rate rises still. I wouldn't be surprised if there's some crisis there. 4. Chinese uneven recovery - the property market may still crash or be unresponsive to stimulus, which will affect the global resources and commodities boom. I'm sounding like a Nouriel Roubini or some other doom and gloomer, so to be sure, I'm still reasonably invested in markets - I'm just being hyper vigilant if something happens and keeping a war chest of cash (now about 25%) on the side.

The strong start to the year is not what I was anticipating, though I have enjoyed some of the ride up. I suspect the recessionary risk to stocks is rather low (it might just be a mild recession if inflation is subsiding already, which means the everyday consumer will still keep the economy going), but the real risk to the share market are geopolitical. China's reopening - so far is on track, and the Chinese seem to be giving a more conciliatory tone (e.g. loosening the de facto embargos on Australian products). The real wildcard is the US debt ceiling - these crazy Freedom Caucus Republicans are going to shut the government down and potentially run into a first-ever default, which is a bona fide black swan event. It's hard to plan for this because pretty much anything will fall in a market where the US Treasuries are destroyed.

I'm not sure the Perrottet thing is going to move the needle much from where things are headed anyway. Before the news, he was probably likely to lose a tight election, and after the news it'll be the same. It reminds me of a Year 12 trivia night we had at school, back in 2003. One group dressed up as "The Terrorists" and wore teatowels on their heads. Only a couple of years after 9/11, that was a pretty insensitive thing to do. But if I kept a photo of it and released it 20 years later with the intention of scuppering someone's reputation, I think it would look quite petty. I mean, with Dom, there's surely better dirt out there if his rivals want to go looking. Try those trade positions again, when he was actually in power and the allegations are more relevant...

Definitely a full day's play today. Good tailend batting by Harmer and Maharaj got them very close to avoiding the follow on (which would surely have sealed the draw) but they fell just short. Ordinarily surviving one final extended afternoon session with 9 wickets in hand shouldn't be much of an ask but you never know with these Saffers' tendency to lose wickets in big clumps this series.

Rain did its best to help South Africa - losing the equivalent of 2 days' play to rain is pretty good going in Australia. But still they lost 6 wickets and now only have 14 left to survive on an extended last day. Incredibly weak batting lineup. Australia in with a good chance of getting a result, I think.

Rain has ruined about 6 sessions worth of cricket in the Sydney Test but South Africa still aren't nailed on for a draw just yet. At 4/110 if they can make the follow on target of 275 they'll be safe with only one (extended) day's play to go.

That's definitely possible. But my theory is based on thinking that any bounce at this time of year will be very short-lived. The Fed will pour cold water on any talk of pausing or easing at this point of time so these "relief rallies" are a bit silly and I expect gains to be given back pretty quickly. Historically the suggestion is that the next bull market in stocks begins when the recession is at its worst, which will probably be late 2023. Oil is going to be an interesting one to watch. There's a tug of war there between China potentially mounting a comeback (or not), the Russian/Ukraine war stopping to ease supply (or not), and a global recession destroying demand (or not). That's too many unknowns for me, I suspect the oil market is going to be schizophrenic this year.

@The Winged Shadow Sorry - I saw your earlier post but I can't make it! I had the wonderful news of being COVID positive on Christmas Day of all days...feeling better now, but still RATted positive today. The kids got through it quickly, my wife is still under the pump though.

Do you invest in the US stock market, @Paxter? I know you're in Canada but I wonder if it's easier to do from there. I've always thought about it, but figured for someone in Australia the exchange rate risk wasn't really an attractive thing. One of my stocks is the Vanguard Global ETF which has a composition of about two-thirds US stocks (and it's top three holdings are Apple, Microsoft and Amazon), so I figure that's the way I get my international diversification.

It will be interesting to see how some of the older Big Tech companies go in the near future. Microsoft and Apple have weathered the storm better than the others in terms of stock price, and unlike some tech companies, their businesses have decades of being proven profitable cash cows. But Apple is starting to hit 52-week lows and an upcoming recession and lack of new product is not going to be pretty. In this sort of environment I reckon Microsoft is the only tech company that might hold up. The NASDAQ is not going to look pretty in 2023.

Elon has always made a habit of overpromising, which was okay when there was no competition. But now Tesla's lack of discipline (or Elon's overly ambitious timelines) are coming up against actual alternatives. They've lost their first-mover advantage, and the brand has lost its "cool" when their CEO is mouthing off all the time. It's going to keep going down in the long run.

Ugh this Test has turned into a borefest again. Based on past history, South Africa will do well to last three sessions, Starcless or not.

I must admit to a bit of schadenfreude about the Tesla stock price carnage going on right now. It's not so much that I dislike Elon Musk (which I do), it's more that this stock has been way overpriced for years. They only recently became profitable and even before then, their market cap was somehow worth more than all the other automakers combined which made no sense. There will be a bounce when Elon eventually refocuses on it, but I think ultimately it still has a long way down to go. In prior years they were operating in an environment where they just couldn't deliver enough cars for the demand for a Tesla. If they could make one they would always be able to sell it. But now, once they've ramped up production, they're finding the demand has melted away - through a combination of Elon's bad PR, other autos catching up, and plummeting consumer sentiment for a high-priced luxury vehicle in a recessionary environment.

Equities are a bit hostage to the central banks next year, that's true enough. If rates keep rising, money will shift from stocks to bonds and the stock market will run into some trouble. When I say mildly positive, I'm looking at further trouble for the first half of the year but some sort of recovery in the second half. There are still a lot of overvalued stocks out there, but given the propensity of the share market to be a forward indicator, I think towards the end of 2023 there will be enough people gorging themselves in preparation for the eventual recovery that the market might find enough support. Enough people missed the 2020 COVID bull run that there will be some trigger happy fund managers out there looking for signs of life. As a personal example, I've cashed up again (my technical rules got me out of a couple of positions in the recent malaise) to about 25% but I expect to find good opportunities to deploy that in early 2023. I also think the ASX200 might be a little more resilient than some of the other markets, as the RBA will be a bit more dovish than most, given the high proportion of variable loans and short-term fixed loans.

Conditions should be good for batting, but we can always hope Warner continues his current run of form...he must see the writing on the wall so this will be his chance for a fairytale ending, though

Well that was disappointing. Some good passages but nowhere near enough to build a score. They'd had a decent start at 0/29 and seen off the first 10 overs, then a collapse which included running out their captain and best batsman, and then a strong rebuild with 100+ run partnership to put them at a semi-respectable 5/179 before losing the last 5 wickets for 10 runs. The South Africans really don't want to score...

Cummins choosing to bowl first on the MCG, which is a bit of a surprise. There are very few pitches in Australia where you would bowl first, last match's greentop excepted. I don't expect the South African batting lineup to make him pay for the decision, but I'm hoping Elgar gets a good knock. I like him; never a star player, always in the background, but now he's the best South Africa have got and they rely on his workmanlike experience. Markram was meant to be the next Big Thing but looks like he was just clean dropped by the selectors for this tour.

Three more trading days to go in 2022 and the ASX200 is down 6.35% for the calendar year. Not as bad as it looked halfway through, but still a negative year nonetheless. The real question is whether this carries over to 2023. Of @Paxter's options I think the "bumpy landing" or the "no landing" are the most likely options. Corporate earnings haven't suffered any major hits yet, and the jury's still out on whether that will happen and to what extent. I think there is a chance that earnings stay relatively stable (with a few exceptions of downgrades) and inflation returns to a more benign reading (probably not 2%, but at least more with a 3-4 handle) with a few more interest rate hikes and then a pause at a 5-handle. In this scenario, unemployment might not have to rise too much. So for shares, I think 2023 might be mildly positive. I'm certainly still staying invested.