It's time to say goodbye.

As we head into offshore trading, Wall Street futures are firmly in the red, Bitcoin is down and the Australian dollar is weaker.

The lesson I have for you today is that global financial markets are going to have to wrestle with one idea: the benefits of potentially lower interest rates or a weakening US economy as jobs disappear.

And here at home, will inflation prove too sticky for the RBA in 2026?

Much to ponder.

I'm going to exit the blog now and stare continuously at the Japanese bond market.

IG's Tony Sycamore has penned his thoughts on the months ahead for the Australian dollar.

Travellers, importers and exporters ... behold:

"In conclusion, while risks remain—including potential geopolitical tensions and unexpected shifts in monetary policy—the prevailing conditions favour a continued recovery for the Australian dollar, towards 0.6940/50 by mid-2026."

• ASX 200: +0.1% at 8,592 points
• Australian dollar: -0.6% at 66.3 US cents
• Wall Street: Dow Jones (1%), S&P 500 (+0.6%), Nasdaq (+0.3%)
• Europe: DAX (-0.1%), FTSE (+0.1%), Stoxx 600 (+0.1%)
• Spot gold: -0.4% to $US4,210/ounce
• Oil (Brent crude): -0.1% to $US 62.12/barrel
• Iron ore: 0.9% to $US102.60/tonne
• Bitcoin: -1.9% at $US90,290
  

Prices as of Thursday 4:30pm AEDT. 

Live updates on the major ASX indices:

The S&P/ASX 200 closed up 12 points today, or 0.1% to 8,592.

The top performing stocks were James Hardie, up 7% and Ramelius Resources, 7%.

The index has lost 0.31% for the last five days.

The benchmark index remains roughly 5% below its all-time high achieved in October.

For those who follow my work, you'll know I'm obsessed with the Japanese 10-year government bond yield.

Why?

Well, Japan is known as the world's bank, so if interest rates begin rising, money could return to Japan and, notably, leave Wall Street.

Today, the 10-year JGB yield fell 0.03% or 3 basis points to 1.92%.

It had been as high as 1.97% this week.

Why has it fallen today? No idea.

This note just dropped from RBC Capital Markets.

It's worth a read:

The seasonally adjusted November data are mixed with enough in there for everyone, sprinkled with some of the usual monthly volatility. 

Taking a step back, the message largely remains the same. This is a labour market which continues to ease gently but remains healthy by historical standards and likely still slightly tight.

Participation and emp/population rates continue to moderate but are still pretty elevated, underutilisation is rising but well below the long-run average and, in trend terms, there remains ongoing monthly job generation. 

The labour market narrative is, perhaps, best captured by the gentle lift in underutilisation, which is a better measure of labour supply than just the unemployment rate. 

It suggests a little more capacity in the labour market, which is helpful given ongoing demand for labour and the strength in the broader measures of earnings, labour costs and compensation at a time [when] core inflation is running above the ceiling of the RBA's 2-3% target. 

With ongoing labour force supply and some moderation in trend employment growth, we continue to expect the UR to move to the top of a 4.25%-4.5% range for much of 2026 and likely test a little above that at times. 

Even with higher underemployment, this may not be enough to materially temper labour costs/compensation and unless productivity picks up on a sustained basis, this will continue to challenge the return to sustainable within target mid-point inflation. 

November CPI on 7 Jan and Q4 CPI on 28 Jan look set to take centre stage.

Getting back to the "risk-off" tone that seems to be infusing global markets as we look towards northern hemisphere trading.

Bitcoin, for example, briefly dipped under $US90,000 a short time ago.

It's currently trading down 2% at $US90,061 at 3:15pm AEDT.

It coincides with falls across the board on Wall Street futures markets.

Hi Phillip,

Few things going on.

Oracle was smashed in extended Wall Street trading, which has hurt NASDAQ futures. Its software revenue disappointed analysts.

There may also be some profit taking following the Federal Reserve's decision to cut the fed funds rate. The question is why is the central bank cutting? The answer, of course, is the weakening jobs market.

Bitcoin is also down 2% roughly speaking, so there's clearly a risk-off tone in the market as we head into Friday trading on Wall Street.

APRA took action again superannuation giant HESTA today, ordering the fund to undertake independent reviews into board governance and risk management after finding its "severe, prolonged" service outage earlier this year "caused direct harm to members".

HESTA chief executive Debby Blakey said the fund took the matters raised by APRA "very seriously and are cooperating fully with the regulator to resolve them".

Consumer advocates were scathing of HESTA's communications with members and conduction during the period of disruption.

On Thursday, Super Consumers Australia welcomed the imposition of licence conditions by APRA.

"This raises serious concerns about the HESTA board and executive's ability to look after their members. HESTA caused serious harm by failing to deliver basic services, with many unable to contact their fund for months," the group's chief executive Xavier O'Halloran said.

"People lost access to their money, faced extreme uncertainty and wasted time because of these failures.

"We heard from one grandmother who was forced to pick up her grandchildren on a bike after she was unable to access her money at HESTA to pay for urgent costs after her car broke down."

Mr O'Halloran said it should be "a lesson to all funds going through similar transitions, they need to put members' interests first and properly resource their customer service".

Super Consumers called on the federal government to implement mandatory customer service standards in super, "to send a clear message to funds that they need to lift their standards or face serious repercussions".

Read more from Adelaide Miller, who has been following the story since April:

As economists' notes trickle in to the ABC business desk, it's clear the number crunchers see the slowing jobs market as putting the Reserve Bank in a difficult position.

CreditorWatch chief economist Ivan Colhoun writes "Australia’s jobs market data for November looks a little strange".

"Jobs falling by 21,000 and full-time jobs dropping by 57,000 suggest a weak employment story," he notes. 

"However, it might just be a statistical quirk because fewer people were looking for work and the survey sample changed.

“Overall, we’re reminded of the RBA Governor’s warning of a few months ago not to over-emphasise any one month’s employment data. 

"The key takeaway from today’s release is that unemployment is still very low at 4.3%, which suggests the job market is still strong overall.

"A low unemployment rate is good news for the economy, but as employers continue to compete for workers, it can also push up wages, which can feed inflation. 

"If inflation figures come in at 0.9% or more for Q4, we may see the RBA raise rates again when they next meet in February."