Trump's copper and pharma tariffs & how to make a telco complaint

Hi everyone, it is Wednesday, the 9th of July 2025. Welcome to the SBS on the Money podcast, where we are giving you consumer finance and markets news you can use without all the fluff. The Australian share market today down by 0.6%. We'll have the details with Francesco Destradas from Ord Minnett in a few moments.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

But first, an increasing number of telco customers are turning to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman for dispute resolution, with 7.1% of telco complaints in the three months to March referred to the TIO — that's up from 6.9%. A customer complains to the TIO when their telcos don't satisfactorily address their issues. The report was done by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

Stephanie Youuf spoke with authority member Samantha York.

SAMANTHA YORKE

The ACMA publishes quarterly reports that list telcos by name and rank them according to the number of complaints they received in that quarter, how quickly they resolved those complaints, and the proportion of complaints that needed to be escalated to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman for further review and resolution.

SAMANTHA YORKE

The latest report covers the January to March 2025 quarter, and this report showed that this is the third consecutive quarter to see an increase in the number of complaints being escalated to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman.

STEPHANIE YOOUF

Which telco had the highest number of complaints that were referred to the ombudsman?

SAMANTHA YORKE

Skyesh, which is an NBN reseller focusing on regional Australia, received the highest percentage of complaints that were referred to the ombudsman, followed by Felix Mobile, which is a TPG brand, and Tangerine Telecom.

STEPHANIE YOOUF

As you mentioned, this is the third straight quarter that we've seen an increase in the number of referrals to the ombudsman. Is this becoming a systemic issue, and what needs to be done to address it?

SAMANTHA YORKE

Yes, this is the third time that we've produced this report, and it is concerning that we've seen an increase in ombudsman referrals each quarter. We'll continue to monitor over the coming months to see if there are any specific factors leading to this trend, and indicating that there might be some systemic issues at play.

SAMANTHA YORKE

What we do know now is that there are several providers who are performing worse than the industry standards. In fact, for certain providers, more than half of consumer complaints end up requiring intervention from the ombudsman, and that's just not acceptable. What needs to be done? Well, it's very simple — telcos should improve their complaint handling processes so that more customers are satisfied with the outcome.

SAMANTHA YORKE

By publicly highlighting how providers are handling these complaints, we're hopefully encouraging underperforming telcos to lift their game, while also recognising and rewarding those who consistently deliver strong customer service.

STEPHANIE YOOUF

It's obviously very frustrating for consumers. What's your advice?

SAMANTHA YORKE

There's two pieces of advice, really. First, if you are thinking about changing your telco provider, take a look at these reports to see how the different telcos measure up on complaint volumes overall and how they manage complaints.

SAMANTHA YORKE

The second piece of advice is if you do want to lodge a complaint about your phone or internet service, please go to your telco first, and if you're unhappy with how they treat your complaint, then take it to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

That is Samantha York there.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

Now, market day on the SBS on the Money podcast. Let's take a look at the Australian share market now because the S&P ASX 200 fell by 0.6% to 8,538.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

Sectors ended mixed. Nine of the eleven sectors were lower, property doing worst, followed by materials and consumer staples. Utilities and energy stocks did rise today. For more on the day's market action, including reaction to those tariffs from the US — potential tariffs on copper and on pharma — I spoke with Francesco De Stradis from Ord Minnett.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Bit of an uninspiring lead from the US.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

And yesterday's rate decision — there was no movement — filtered through overnight, and the market's probably got a grasp of what it meant to the markets. But you know, two of the sectors that are really getting hit today: the REITs, and that's on the back of expectations that we were expecting a rate cut. So the property sector's probably taking a little bit of a hit today.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Material stocks are lower. Gold futures are lower, so Newmont Mines and a lot of the other smaller gold miners are lower. Copper prices, while they were higher overnight, futures are looking a bit lower. So some of the smaller copper miners are a bit lower at the moment as well. But look, nothing to really be concerned about. I think the market's had a really good run over the last couple of weeks and probably needs a bit of a breather at this stage.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

OK, so let's talk about Donald Trump then, because there's always a lot to talk about there.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

We certainly do, mate.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

Particularly these potential new tariffs, right? So a possible 50% tariff on copper, which could impact the likes of Rio and BHP

RICARDO GONÇALVES

via the Escondida copper mine in Chile. And then there's a potential 200% tariff on pharmaceutical products. It could impact the likes of CSL, which has operations in the US also. What's interesting though, from my perspective, is that

RICARDO GONÇALVES

yes, their shares are down as we approach the close, but they haven't been slammed. In fact, they're down with the rest of the market, right? So I'm keen to get your take on what do you make of these threats, the potential implications, especially on those three huge companies, and what do you think the market reaction says about it?

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Yeah. Look, the three biggest exports that Australia sends to the US are meat and meat products, pharmaceuticals, and medical equipment. So not a lot of our commodities go from Australia to the US. They probably end up in the US indirectly through either China or other manufacturing countries, but a lot of our commodities don't end up there. So if you look at

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

the tariff placed on copper — BHP and Rio are the two miners that everyone knows in Australia — I think you'll find that their diversification removes a little bit of that risk. I'm not sure, and I'm sure analysts will start putting a lot of information out over the next couple of days, but I think probably less than 1% of their copper goes to the US directly. So I think indirectly it might affect it.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

But my theory on copper is that ultimately the demand for copper will continue to increase with the more and more investment in renewable energies, which means that a lot of electricity grids — not just here in Australia but around the world — need to be upgraded. Takes a lot of copper. So I think copper's going to be a bit volatile, but I don't think it's going to really negatively impact it because of the demand that will come through. On the pharmaceutical side of things, you're right.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

CSL is probably our biggest and best, but you've got to remember CSL do manufacture a lot of their pharmaceuticals in the US. From my understanding, they won't be subject to the tariffs if they're manufactured within the US. So, looking at those two share prices — you're right — they haven't been severely negatively impacted, and partly because I think the market needs to understand a bit about how those tariffs will work on

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

foreign companies — when I say foreign, I mean foreign from the US — and whether they manufacture those products within the US or offshore. But I think you'll find that CSL manufactures a lot of their, particularly for the local market in the US, manufactures in the US. And then for our biggest export to the US, which is meat products, it's hard to find a listed company. There's the Australian Agricultural Corporation — I don't think

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

they're much of a big player in our market at the moment either, so it's not really having any impact upon the market from the meat side of things.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

OK, elsewhere, any other company news you're looking out for today?

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Yeah, Lifestyle Communities came back on the market today after having a decision in the Victorian court go against them. The stock price is down 35% to 40%, big movement in that share price. I believe management are considering that they're going to challenge the decision, so I suspect that they probably will.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

The decision comes about on deferred management fees or exit fees on these retirement homes. So the basis of their business is that they lease the land to the household. They have like a temporary accommodation on it, which they own, and when they remove themselves from that accommodation for

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

whatever reason — won't go into the full details — there are exit costs. It's been challenged by 83 people that it's not legal within the Victorian market. So there's still a bit of that to play out, but if it does continue that way, significantly negative for Lifestyle and some of the other retirement village investments out there.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Another one — Telix Pharmaceuticals — we've just talked about pharmaceuticals. They've just had a prostate cancer imaging product proposed onto the Medicare and Medicaid system. It's been approved. That's a big win for them. The stock's up around 6%.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Probably would have been more if it wasn't for this news on tariffs around pharmaceuticals. And I think the market at the moment is probably sitting on their hands a little bit. We're moving into confession season before the reporting season. I suspect over the next couple of weeks we'll see one or two companies, if not more, come out and give a bit of guidance upgrade on their results for FY25.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

Yesterday we saw the Reserve Bank surprise a lot of people in holding interest rates instead of cutting them. What's the latest market pricing for future rate cuts? Because in other parts of the world, like in New Zealand today, rates there stayed on hold.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Yeah, it was a big surprise to the market. The share market fell dramatically immediately on the news but recovered through the rest of the afternoon yesterday, so it was interesting to see how that played out. Ninety-six percent of market participants were predicting a rate cut. It didn't come about.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

So, looking at some of the news coming out this morning, I think everyone's just moved on from a rate cut in July to a rate cut in August. Looking at some of the commentary around the decision, it was 6 to 3 to hold, so there's still a bit of support for a cut there on the board of the Reserve Bank.

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

The commentary around it was that the direction is right — so downward — it's just the timing. So everyone's moved their forecast forward to August. I suspect that'll be the case. The Reserve Bank did quote that the inflation numbers

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

last month were monthly; they want to see quarterly numbers. We will see a quarterly number before the next meeting. And they want to see some productivity improvements as well. I think maybe because the US also held firm on rates in their recent decision,

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

it probably made it a little bit easier for them to sit pat. If they were to cut rates, it probably would have had a negative impact on the Aussie dollar, and we don't want to be too volatile in our currency at the moment either.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

OK, and finally with the economic environment how it is at the moment, where do you see the opportunities for investors and what are you telling your clients right now?

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

Yeah, look, we're really looking at client portfolios and advising on a bit of rebalancing. There's a number of stocks that have actually performed significantly well over the last 12 to 18 months, and over the June 30 period, we're looking at holdings that are a little bit out of whack. So, you know, stocks that have performed well like HUB and CBA and Aristocrat, ResMed — they're getting to

FRANCESCO DE STRADIS

positions where they're overweight in portfolios. We've been trimming off the top of that and moving more into things that have underperformed but we still like the businesses — things like Woolies, things like Rio Tinto you mentioned earlier, and Endeavour Drinks is another one. So we're just doing a bit of rebalancing in portfolios at the moment, particularly now with reporting season on the horizon. We don't want to disrupt the apple cart.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

That's Francesco De Stradis from Ord Minnett.

RICARDO GONÇALVES

That ends the podcast for this Wednesday. Don't forget to give it a rating or a review on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, tell your mates, and click subscribe.

SPEAKER 1

This SBS on the Money podcast is provided for informational purposes only. The content on this podcast should not be understood as constituting advice or a recommendation. It is not personal advice and does not consider your personal circumstances or objectives. You should contact a licensed professional before making any financial decision.

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