Wry & Dry: a cynical and irreverent review of the week in politics, economics and life. For intelligent Readers who disdain the trivial.
Investment Matters
This week Craig focuses on:
- Iran War, the importance of a path to resolution
- deploying cash: what are the opportunities?
- merits of Income Securities in changing economic conditions
- review for Nanosonics’ results
Read this week’s edition of Investment Matters.
1. Wry & Dry’s ponderings…
This week is a bumper issue: extra musings, extra cartoons. Be excited by: Trumpster’s carries his tablet of 15 points down the mountain. “Don’t panic buy! Don’t panic buy!” One Policy One Nation senses power surge. Farmers revolt at free trade agreement. Bring on the revolution.
2. Meanwhile, guess who’s coming down the mountain?
It is correctly said that no-one knows the mind of God. Equally, no-one knows the mind of Trumpster. But at least God knows what he is doing and why. Trumpster has no idea of what he is doing, much less why.
Which brings Wry & Dry to the Middle East, where Trumpster has come down the mountain with a tablet of stone in hand. Always seeking to outcompete, his tablet has 15 points on it – his plan for peace. As Moses had only 10 points on his tablet, Trumpster might have saved his stonemason the trouble, and had just 11. But to Trumpster, size is everything, in contradistinction to his small feet.
Moses’ 10 points were very explicit, and plainly the mind of God. On the other hand, Trumpster’s 15 points, in deference to local fauna, resembled a horse designed by a committee, i.e. a camel. They leave lots of wriggle room, and are negotiable; the basis for a ‘deal’.
Moses’ 10 points were binary: “well, it’s your choice: heaven or hell.” Trumpster’s were also binary, and backed by Mosaic threats: “President Trump does not bluff, and he is prepared to unleash hell.”1 Is this a core threat, or a non-core threat2. But the Iranians know, as the galaxy knows, Trumpster’s threats are non-core. A TACO moment was expected. And it happened. This morning, Trumpster extended his threat to “unleash hell” for a further 10 days.
Y’see, Trumpster now wants a deal with someone in Iran, with its ostensible new “most respected” figure: Mohammad Ghalibaf, the Iranian parliament’s speaker. Ghalibaf is a former commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, who made terrorism Iran’s most well-known export. Ghalibaf was also the murderous suppressor of domestic anti-regime protests.
Ghalibaf and his family are the owners of multiple luxury apartments in Istanbul. Ghalibaf is also extraordinarily corrupt, so should get on very well with Trumpster.
Trumpster’s demand for ‘unconditional surrender’ has gone OTD, and has been replaced by a ‘deal’. The problem with this is that his 15-point deal resembles in form his 20-point plan for Gaza last September. And look how that is turning out. He said that Hamas was ready for peace. Err, no. Six months later, Hamas is still governing most Gazans, has not disarmed, is currently regrouping and rearming.
If Trumpster does a deal with different faces of the same regime, he is subverting his own war goals. Yes, the oil will flow. And the world will rejoice. The missiles will stop. But just for now. And Iran will keep its foot on the throat called the Straits of Hormuz.
1 Karoline Leavitt, Trumpster’s press secretary.
2 Former PM Keating reneged on a critical election promise as it was a ‘non-core’ promise.
3. “Don’t panic buy. Don’t panic buy!”
A legion of keen young news reporters is using precious fuel reserves to drive to distant parts to be “our reporter reporting on another servo that has run out of petrol.” Cue video of reporter standing in front of a bowser with hand drawn ‘empty’ signs blue-tacked on both sides.
And then a breathless interview with a local topping up a jerry can, ‘just in case.’ Who would have thought there’ be another oil crisis?
All of this followed the news anchor saying, in Victoria, “92 servos have run out of petrol!”
What the anchor didn’t say was that in Victoria, 1,473 servos have petrol.
This compounded Uncle Albo’s opaque comment last Saturday, when asked about the possibility of petrol rationing: “That’s a decision for state and territory government, so it’s not a question for me.”
Memories of Miracle Morrison’s “I don’t hold a hose, mate.”
Then followed Energy Minister Bowen obfuscating for four days about the reality of the fuel situation, repeating like Lance Corporal Jones3 “Don’t panic buy, don’t panic buy!” Well, people did and have. Uncle Albo kindly allowed Bowen to dig a deeper hole with each utterance.
It took until Wednesday for Uncle Albo to realise that he was actually the prime minister, not Bowen. And daily data briefings emerged. And soothing noises were made.
But, by then, Australia was aquiver with uncertainty.
3 Lance Corporal Jack Jones is a fictional Home Guard platoon lance corporal and veteran of the British Empire, in the BBC television sitcom Dad’s Army. His cries of “don’t panic” engendered even more panic.
4. Meanwhile, inside South Australia…
The governing Labor Party belted all comers in last week’s state election in South Australia. But the highlight was not that Labor won, but that One Policy One Nation out-voted the Coalition on first preferences.
A preliminary demographic analysis showed that One Policy One Nation’s vote was strongest in:
- 9 of the top 10 seats for people earning less than $41,600 p.a.
- 8 of the top 10 seats for labourers
- 8 of the top 10 seats for people born in Australia
- The bottom 17 seats for people without a postgraduate degree
Just sayin’.
The trouble for One Policy One Nation is that the more votes it gets, without a very tight preference deal with the Coalition, the stronger becomes Labor’s position.
But One Policy One Nation’s One Cell Leader is hedging her bets on a deal.
5. EU trade deal
Almost all bilateral tariffs between Australia and the EU will soon be abolished. Happy days. Everyone is delighted. Err, not everyone.
Beef and sheep farmers are not happy campers with their almost 800% increase in quotas for tariff free exports to the EU. Y’see, it’s not what they got, it’s what their competitors got. Sort of FOMO. New Zealand’s sheep meat quota is five times that of Australia and Canada’s beef quota is just under double.
What the beef and sheep farmers missed was that each of Canada and New Zealand were negotiating essentially on only beef and sheep. Australia’s deal with the EU is considerably broader. For example, other farmers are winners: 100% of tariffs on vegetables, fruits and tree nuts and 87% of those on dairy products will go.
And critically, Australian producers can still use the term ‘Prosecco’. Vital stuff.
6. Bring on the revolution
UK tabloids will always have content, even after Trumpster departs this mortal coil. Australians may have missed that a baronet4 is being sued by his ex-wife over her desire to sell his house to pay for her debts. But that’s not the interesting story.
The baronet, Sir Benjamin Slade, the 7th Baronet of Maunsel, was smart enough to inherit a fortune, a title, a castle and 2,000 acres. And that is where his smarts end.
After he divorced his wife (“because of her 17 cats” – well, that’s fair enough), he appeared on a morning television programme searching for a “castle-trained” wife to give birth to his heir. He stipulated she must have a shotgun licence, a driving licence, a coat of arms, and be young enough to have sons. He rejected candidates from countries beginning with an ‘I’ or with green in the flag (with the exception of Italian and northern Indian women), Scots, lesbians, and communists.
Slade’s different view of life was confirmed in 2017 by an employment tribunal. It found him to have unfairly dismissed and egregiously discriminated against two women who worked for him. Each of whom had become pregnant to him within a few weeks of each other.
Perhaps he hadn’t noticed that the days of serfs and yeomen were over.
4 A member of the lowest hereditary titled British order, with the status of a commoner but able to use the prefix ‘Sir’.
7. Nice work. If you can get it.
Just ‘cos Barnaby Joyce turned his coat and joined One Policy One Nation; the latter’s One Cell Leader now gets a $100,000 salary increase.
Y’see, One Policy One Nation is now a ‘minor party’ i.e. by adding Barnaby to the party, it has five or more members in federal parliament. The leader of a minor party receives $341,000 p.a, a 43% raise from that of humble backbencher without a party.
Wry & Dry is not sure that managing Barnaby Joyce is worth an extra $100,000 p.a.
8. Unhappy Americans
The Economist magazine this morning reported that the University of Michigan had reported that its gauge of consumer sentiment is just a bee’s wing ahead of its lowest point since the measure began in 1952.
Chart source: The Economist 27 March 2026.
Wry & Dry hesitates to suggest a reason why American consumers are so unhappy. Of course, any correlation between (a) the survey’s downturn from 2024 and (b) Trumpster’s election doesn’t mean causation. Does it?
9. Worse than the 1970’s oil crises? Nuh.
There is much ado about something. This week, experts were saying that the current oil situation is worse than the 1970s oil shocks. Err, nuh.
If Readers want to understand ‘ardship, click Monty Python ‘Ardship. If not, read on.
The 1973 oil crisis was a result of two main factors.
Firstly, the Yom Kippur War, when Egypt and Syria (aided by Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Iraq and Jordan) invaded Israel in a stunning surprise attack. The aim was to retake the Sinai Peninsula, which Egypt lost in the Six-Day War of 1967. The Arab invaders failed. The US resupplied Israel (as the Soviet Union did to each of Egypt and Syria).
This caused OAPEC to get grumpy, and cut production and impose an oil embargo on oil shipments to the US (and to Netherlands).
Secondly, the embargo followed the peak of oil production in Venezuela (1970), the US (1970) and Iran (1973). A sort-of ‘peak oil’ occurred.
As a result, the price of oil leapt from $3 to $12 virtually overnight, a 400% increase. Inflation in the US hit 15% and 20% in the UK.
Fast-forward to today. Over the last five weeks, the price of oil has almost doubled. Whilst inflation will almost certainly rise, it is unlikely to reach 15%. Well, so says Grim Jim.
Recessions in the US, UK, and Japan followed the 1973 oil shock, and unemployment rose sharply.
‘Ardship? Nothing like the 1970s.
10. One correct Trumpster decision
Readers have by now forgotten Kristi Noem, Trumpster’s former head of the Department of Homeland Security. Well, she apparently got the DCM for her poor handling of anti-ICE protests in Minneapolis.
Err, maybe not.
It seems she spent $220m of US taxpayers’ funds on a 60 second marketing campaign for her department. The recent Best Picture Oscar for One Battle After Another cost a mere $175m.
But wait! There’s more:
- The production company was awarded the no-bid contract just seven days after it was incorporated
- It was led by the husband of Noem’s communications manager
- It was given a $60,000 signing bonus
- In the video, Noem is dressed as a cowgirl riding in front of Mount Rushmore and galloping across plains full of buffalo.
Just gotta lurv governance in government.
11. Paid not to play
This is weird. The Trump administration will pay the French energy giant TotalEnergies $1 billion not to build wind farms off the East Coast of the US. TotalEnergies paid the $1 billion for leases during Sleepy Joe’s tenure.
But wait, there’s more. As part of the deal, TotalEnergies must spend the $1 billion on oil and gas projects in the US.
So, the US taxpayer is paying a foreign company to boost the production of fossil fuels whilst as the same time shuttering offshore wind power.
Trumpster would say that’s a win-win. It’s not, really. It’s a little complicated, but in the wind power project, TotalEnergies was taking the risk of the wind power plants being profitable. Now it’s the US taxpayer taking the risk of TotalEnergies’ investment.
Snippets from all over
Arctic sea ice in retreat
Last winter’s Arctic sea ice was the smallest ever recorded for the second year in a row, according to analysis published by America’s national satellite and ocean research agencies. (The Economist 27 March)
Wry & Dry comments: An area the size of Greenland has been lost since records began in 1979.
Democrat wins by-election in Trumpster’s electorate
Donald Trump suffered a symbolic political blow on Tuesday when a Democrat flipped control of the Florida state legislature seat that represents Palm Beach, home to the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate. (Financial Times 25 March)
Wry & Dry comments: At the 2024 election, a Republican won by 11 percentage points. Canary in the coal mine?
Tsar Vlad puts out the begging bowl
Vladimir Putin has asked oligarchs to donate to Russia’s budget in a bid to stabilise the country’s finances as he presses on with his invasion of Ukraine, according to three people familiar with the matter. (Financial Times 27 March)
Wry & Dry comments: In January, Tsar Vlad increased VAT (i.e. GST) to 22%.
Jewish charity’s ambulances firebombed
[UK] Security services and police are investigating whether Iran could be behind an arson attack on four ambulances serving a Jewish community in north London, after a group linked to Tehran said it was responsible. (The Times 24 March)
Wry & Dry comments: Is Starmer still feeding the crocodile?
Italian PM poll setback
Giorgia Meloni has suffered a defeat in a referendum widely seen as a verdict on her leadership of Italy. Exit polls pointed to a comfortable victory for the opposition-backed “No” bloc in the first major political setback for the Italian prime minister, who must call a general election next year. (UK Telegraph 24 March)
Wry & Dry comments: The matter was trivial, and was always going to be difficult to win.
It figures
- 63.1: Australia, consumer confidence, measured by ANZ-Roy Morgan, down 5.4 points to a record low.
And to soothe your troubled mind…
“We had the UK say ‘we’ll send our aircraft carriers’, which aren’t the best aircraft carriers. They’re toys compared to what we have.”
Trumpster, still grumpy at UK PM Starmer for not supporting him in his Middle Eastern carpet ride.
Wry & Dry comments: But Starmer has bigger feet.
Disclaimer
The comments in Wry & Dry do not necessarily reflect those of First Samuel, its Directors or Associates.
Vacation
Wry & Dry is going on vacation next week. His quill will return on Friday 24 April. Investment Matters will continue.
Cheers!