Wednesday 24th June 2026 NAB Markets Research Disclaimer Financial Services Guide | Information on our services - NAB There have been big global move down in equities yesterday and that continued overnight. NAB’s Taylor Nugent joins Phil to discuss this risk-off mood. There’s no clear trigger except shares rose quickly last week. The Iran situation certainly wasn’t responsible after another day with more ships leaving the Strait and oil prices continuing to fall. But why has the Aussie dollar taken such a big hit? They also discuss yesterday’s PMIs and look ahead to today’s Australian inflation numbers. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Risk off, but why?

NAB Morning Call

# Full Transcript

**Podcast:** NAB Morning Call

## Participants

- **Phil Dobbie** (NAB)
- **Taylor Nugent** (NAB)

## Transcript

Markets decidedly risk off today, although there doesn't seem to be any trigger for that. Too much good news perhaps, people have got more time to look at stuff. Things in the Gulf seem to be heading in the right direction for example, and for ships in the Gulf that direction is out. And Australian CPI today, what's expected and what's the outlook? It is Wednesday, it's the 24th of June, 2026. It's the morning call from NAB. Good morning.

Oil is low, we've got 1% off Brent and WTI. Brent now down to 77 a barrel, it did get down to 76.43. Silver and gold also well down, we've got a 5.8% drop in silver. Big falls in US equities again. The NASDAQ has lost 1.9%, the S&P 1.2% down. In Europe the DAX lost 1%, the Eurostox 50 down 1.3%.

And falls in Asia yesterday were brutal, the Nikkei losing 3.5%, the CSI 300 down 2.8%. And bond yields lower, down two basis points for 10-year Treasuries, down three basis points in Germany and France, and down five basis points for 10-year gilt yields in the UK.

The US dollar is 0.4% higher on the DXY. The Aussie is down 1.3%, down to just 65.9 US cents today. Once again, the biggest mover of the major currencies. Taylor Nugent joins me today. Anyway, so stock markets hit by AI concerns it seems. I mean chip makers have been hit the most. I mean South Korea's KOSPI fell 10% yesterday. Mind you, it has almost doubled in the last year.

So what's triggered all of this, Taylor? Is it just a bit of a reality check on AI investments, but all in one day? Yeah, good morning Phil. So yeah, pretty clear risk off tone across markets and really the epicenter was that tech AI story and chip makers in particular. It was very evident all through our session yesterday as well. You mentioned there the KOSPI down 10%. Overnight declines in the US were led by chip makers. Micron down 13%, Qualcomm down almost 9%.

The kind of broader Philadelphia Semiconductor Index was 8.5% lower on the day. But I do think that, well, it's not obvious what the kind of proximate catalyst here was. Some perspective is important and that 8.5% drop on the day in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index takes it all the way back to where it was on Thursday. So I think it is in the scheme of some reasonably large moves that we've seen in these markets recently.

But certainly, you know, the Aussie, it had been holding around 70 reasonably resilient to some softer risk sentiment in the last couple of days. But, you know, certainly gave way amid that kind of broader risk off tone and that stronger US dollar and the Australian dollar clear underperformer. And the yen, I mean, normally when you get risk off, you'd normally expect the yen to rise, but it hasn't. And there's a question about currency intervention as well. Clearly, if that's the case, it's clearly not worked.

Yeah. So the Aussie, the, you know, clear underperformer a...

Risk off, but why?

Transcript

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Risk off, but why?

Transcript

Built for investment professionals

Every day you wait, your competitors are findingedge in conversations you're not hearing.

Every day you wait, your competitors are finding
edge in conversations you're not hearing.