The Western Australian gas crisis looks set to continue for six to eight weeks, but there should be a marked improvement from mid-August onwards.

Australia is fully-mounted on the current global inflationary surge in energy: our energy exports are forecast to jump 81% in value in the coming financial year alone to $88 billion, the value of mineral exports is forecast to rise by a quarter and the value of rural exports could be up 12%.

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Car sales remain stronger than a year ago, despite a fall in sales of four-wheel-drive vehicles in May.

There will be a wary group of investors sticking their heads up today and wondering just where the damage in the financial engineering (property trust and associated entities) sector will end.

A bad week for markets around the world with three month lows explored in Australia, Europe, the US and parts of Asia.

There’s only one big event this week and that’s the two-day US Federal Reserve meeting in Washington that won’t see a lift in US interest rates.

Food & energy are the main drivers of the rise in inflation right now, although price pressures are broader in parts of Asia and Australia.

The West Australian gas crisis continues to grow in importance with the Federal Government finally recognising its national potential.

Australia’s 2008-09 wheat crop will be down from earlier forecasts because of the dry May, but other grain crops still look like being larger than the last two drought hit crops.