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Entertainment

Judith Durham dead: ‘The Seekers’ singer and legendary Australian music icon, dies aged 79, as primary cause of death is revealed

Judith Durham dead: 'The Seekers' singer and legendary Australian music icon, dies aged 79, as primary cause of death is revealed

Australian music legend Judith Durham has died at the age of 79.

Durham AOM rose to fame as the lead singer of The Seekers, best known for I’ll Never Find Another You, I Am Australian and The Carnival Is Over.

Seven’s entertainment editor Peter Ford tweeted the news of her passing, describing her as “one of this country’s great singers”.

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“As part of The Seekers and as a solo performer she was superb,” he said.

“Also a truly kind and generous person.”

The Seekers perform in Canberra during their Golden Jubilee tour in 2013. Credit: ALAN PORRITT/AAPIMAGE

She is understood to have died in hospital on Friday night following a battle with chronic illness.

Durham joined The Seekers in the 1960s alongside Athol Guy, Keith Potger and Bruce Woodley in Melbourne.

In 1967, the band members were named as joint recipients of the Australian of the Year award, the only group to be honored to date.

The band disbanded a year later when Durham left to pursue a solo career but reunited for shows over the coming decades.

In 1995, The Seekers were inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame and, almost two decades later, the members were individually honored as Officers of the Order of Australia.

Durham married her musical director Ron Edgeworth in 1969 before briefly moving to Europe.

Seekers lead singer Judith Durham has died aged 79. Credit: JULIAN SMITH/AAPIMAGE
Judith Durham in Melbourne in 2011. Credit: Martin Philbey/AP

In 1990, the couple and their tour manager Peter Summers were involved in a car accident in Victoria, resulting in the death of the driver of the other car, as well as Durham suffering a broken wrist and leg.

The response from fans prompted a meeting of The Seekers for a Silver Jubilee show. During this meeting, Edgeworth would be diagnosed with motor neuron disease, dying in 1994.

In May 2013, the band reunited again for a Golden Jubilee tour. However, Durham would suffer a stroke that impacted her ability to read and write – including reading music sheets.

Her singing was not impacted by the stroke.

In 2015, she was named Victorian of the Year for her services to music and involvement with charities.

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Sports

Nick Kyrgios Washington Open, ATP results, scores, def Frances Tiafoe, Kyrgios vs Mikael Ymer, ranking

Nick Kyrgios Washington Open, ATP results, scores, def Frances Tiafoe, Kyrgios vs Mikael Ymer, ranking

Australia’s Nick Kyrgios and top seed Andrey Rublev each won twice on Friday (US time) to reach the semi-finals of the ATP and WTA Washington Open.

World number eight Rublev defeated 32nd-ranked Maxime Cressy 6-4, 7-6 (10/8) in one hour and 42 minutes then eliminated 99th-ranked wildcard JJ Wolf 6-2, 6-3 in 78 minutes.

“I didn’t spend much time in court,” Rublev said of his three-hour total. “That was the main key today.”

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Rain Thursday night forced double duty upon Rublev and several others but Friday storms provided everyone a timely rest break between matches.

Wimbledon runner-up Nick Kyrgios fired 35 aces on his way to beating hometown hero Frances Tiafoe 6-7 (5/7), 7-6 (14/12), 6-2 and reaching the other semi-final against Sweden’s 115th- ranked Mikael Ymer.

Australia’s 63rd-ranked Kyrgios, who won the most recent of his six ATP titles at Washington in 2019, needed only 14 minutes to complete an early win over US fourth seed Reilly Opelka 7-6 (7/1), 6-2.

Kyrgios then outlasted 27th-ranked Tiafoe after two and a half hours, yelling, “I want to go to bed,” in the third set of a match that ended at 1 in the morning.

Tiafoe won the last five points of the first-set tiebreaker, the last on his sixth ace, and had four match points in the second-set tiebreaker.

But Kyrgios answered with an ace, backhand winner, forehand volley winner and service return winner and forced a third set when Tiafoe sent a forehand long.

Tiafoe, who won a third set earlier to defeat Dutch eighth seed Botic van de Zandschulp, hit a crosscourt forehand wide to hand Kyrgios a break to open the third set and missed a backhand to drop a break in the seventh before Kyrgios held to advance.

The Aussie hit 60 winners and saved five match points in all.

The Washington Post’s Ella Brockway tweeted: “This Kyrgios-Tiafoe match is absolutely bonkers.

“There are few things in sports quite like The Nick Kyrgios Experience.”

Kyrgios wins hearts with gift for fan | 00:37

Ymer, who lost his only ATP final last August at Winston-Salem, beat 54th-ranked American Sebastian Korda 6-2, 5-7, 6-3 after two hours and 27 minutes.

Rublev, whose only other two-win day was at Washington in 2018, rolled through the first set against Wolf in 28 minutes, then broke to lead 2-1 and cruised from there.

Next in Rublev’s path is Japan’s 96th-ranked Yoshihito Nishioka, who outlasted British 16th seed Daniel Evans 7-6 (7/5), 4-6, 7-5 after three hours and 35 minutes.

“Rather than to spend two matches like me than one match like him,” Rublev said.

Nishioka improved to 5-0 all-time against the 40th-ranked Englishman in the rain-interrupted affair to reach his first ATP semi-final since 2020 at Delray Beach. His only ATP title came at Shenzhen in 2018.

“I never gave up and that’s the way I think I won,” Nishioka said. “I just focused on making a lot of balls and to play long rallies. I knew he didn’t want to because he was getting tired.”

Rublev seeks his 12th career crown and fourth title of the season after Marseilles, Dubai and Belgrade to match Spaniards Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz for the most ATP trophies this year.

Estonia’s Kaia Kanepi defeated Anna Kalinskaya 6-7 (4/7), 6-4, 6-3 to reach a semi-final against Aussie Daria Saville, who beat Canadian qualifier Rebecca Marino 6-1, 7-5.

It’s Saville’s first semi-final since 2018 at Acapulco while Kanepi, her age and world rank at 37, seeks her fifth career WTA title but first since the 2013 Brussels Open.

World number 20 Victoria Azarenka, a two-time Australian Open champion, won her first match over Czech Tereza Martincova 7-6 (9/7), 6-2, but her double bid was spoiled by 21-year-old Chinese lucky loser Wang Xiyu.

Wang, seeking her first WTA title, rolled over 33-year-old Azarenka 6-1, 6-3. The 95th-ranked left-hander reached her first WTA semi-final in June at Valencia.

Wang next plays 60th-ranked Liudmila Samsonova, who upset 10th-ranked reigning US Open champion Emma Raducanu 7-6 (8/6), 6-1. The 19-year-old British second seed was seeking her first semi-final since her Grand Slam triumph,

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Categories
Australia

NSW commuters to face more rail disruptions, including strikes in month-long campaign

a woman walking on a platform at a rail station as she approaches a parked train

NSW rail workers are ramping up industrial action for a month from Sunday by refusing to issue fines, leaving gates at train stations open and taking part in rolling targeted strikes.

The action is part of the Rail, Tram and Bus Union’s (RTBU) ongoing campaign to secure safety changes to the new intercity fleet, in the face of what they say is the NSW government’s stubborn refusal to do so.

RTBU NSW secretary Alex Claassens said workers were hopeful the government would sign a document committing to the modifications.

“We’ve done everything by the book in order to get these vital safety changes, but the government is refusing to listen,” he said.

“We’ve had plenty of verbal promises before, which is why this time we need to see it committed to in a binding document.”

a man with a mustache looking sideways
Alex Claassens hopes the NSW government will commit to fixing the intercity fleet.(abcnews)

The union and the state government have for months been at odds over the safety of the $2 billion intercity fleet, which has remained idle in maintenance sheds despite a planned rollout in 2019.

One of the main points of concern for the union is guards not being able to see children “during crucial moments.”

Rolling strikes will start on Wednesday, August 10 from 10am to 4pm, with the union saying strikes will occur in one area at a time — meaning that trains will be able to continue to run in most areas of the state.

Commuters will also face rolling strikes on Wednesday, August 17, Tuesday, August 23 and Thursday, August 25.

Other industrial action includes a ban on operating foreign-made trains, transport officers not issuing fines and a ban on cleaners using vacuum cleaners or scrubbing machines.

Mr Claassens said he accepted there would be some impact on commuters, but said the union would try to minimize it.

“We’ve done a lot of work to ensure that our actions will impact management and the government and not the traveling public,” he said.

“There’s no reason why, with some planning and common sense, trains cannot continue to run relatively smoothly while our actions are happening.

“We understand that commuters will be frustrated because we’re frustrated too.”

NSW Transport has been contacted for comment.

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Categories
US

Beefy rain Sunday through Monday has early look of flash flood potential

Beefy rain Sunday through Monday has early look of flash flood potential

Another widespread rain with thunderstorms is expected to fall across all of Michigan Sunday into Monday. Northern Michigan has had several inches of rain this week, and is highlighted as an area of ​​possible flash flooding.

While most of us should just get another very useful rain Sunday night and Monday, the weather set-up has the ability to produce streaks of three inches to four inches of rain. Flash flooding is possible in northern Michigan. Southern Michigan was very dry going into this week’s rain, and southern Michigan soils can still take several inches of rain before flash flooding.

rain

Source: National Weather Service – Gaylord, MI

I see four ingredients lining up to make up to four inches of possible rain in the total rain amounts by Monday night.

First, we will have very abundant water vapor in the air over Michigan. These tiny, invisible droplets are what eventually stick together to form a raindrop. Imagine a sponge full of water but not dripping. As you squeeze the sponge, the water empties out of it. We will have a loaded sponge in the air.

Next, a cold front will move almost straight south across Lower Michigan. This motion is important because that type of movement usually has a slower speed of movement when compared to a cold front moving west to east across Michigan. Slower speed means the thunderstorms can last longer.

Third is the possibility of “train echoes.” Train echoes are individual thunderstorm cells that move west to east over the same spot, like train cars traveling over the same tracks. In a train echo situation you can get three or four half-hour thunderstorms track right over the same spot. When each thunderstorm drops one-half inch to one-inch of rain, four bursts of that magnitude really add up.

Finally we will watch the time of day for the storms. This is very important. Peak heating in the late afternoon and evening makes thunderstorms the strongest at that time of the day. There is also a secondary peak of instability an hour either side of sunrise.

So we will likely see a train of thunderstorms moving east, and gradually shifting south. The storms will be strongest in the early morning and late afternoon/evening and then weaken some late in the morning and early afternoon. This whole scenario will go from Saturday night in the UP to Monday night in far southern Lower Michigan.

Here’s a rain forecast showing six-hour periods of rain totals.

rain

Six-hour rain forecasts from Saturday night to Tuesday morning.

Here’s a total rainfall forecast. You can expect the heaviest thunderstorms to drop two to three times the overall general rainfall forecast.

rain

Total rainfall forecast through Tuesday from the Weather Prediction Center at NOAA

Generally you can see we all can expect another nice rain, and that should take away any dryness in the soil for our landscapes and farmers’ crops.

The National Weather Service mentions that two to three inches of rain could produce flash flooding in the UP and northern Lower Michigan, where up to three inches of rain fell early this week. Watch for updates as the weather system gets closer to Michigan.

Categories
Business

Copper worth nearly half a billion dollars goes missing in China

Copper worth nearly half a billion dollars goes missing in China

The group has a total claim on 300,000 tons of concentrate worth about 5 billion yuan ($740 million), but there’s only 100,000 tons at the depot, the people said. That puts the dollar value of the missing material at about $490 million.

The copper discrepancy in Hebei province comes just months after a separate dispute, spanning several locations in southern China, over missing aluminum tied to $1 billion of lending. Scrutiny of commodities financing and warehouse operations in China is growing, especially as volatile global markets expose some of the more opaque funding arrangements to greater risk.

At the center of this latest case is Huludao Risun Trading Co., a medium-sized merchant that purchases between 800,000 and 1 million tons of imported copper concentrate a year for distribution to domestic Chinese smelters, said the people. The company typically relies on larger counterparties to finance the materials, and then repays the loans with interest and fees after finalizing the trade.

Nobody picked up several calls to the company’s main number, and there was no immediate reply to an email seeking comment.

risky business

Commodities traders have faced a tougher environment this year as banks turn cautious in the wake of high-profile losses — especially in the nickel market — and huge price volatility exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. That’s encouraged alternative financing, in which smaller, privately-owned firms pledge their goods to large state-run traders to obtain funding for operations.

But that route is also exposed to risk as the growth model that’s sustained China’s economy for decades shows signs of strain. Some state-owned enterprises, including the country’s top steel mills, have asked units to cut back on operations — including third-party trading — to preserve cash and avoid liquidity crunches.

The impact on the spot concentrate market of the Qinhuangdao copper dispute could be limited, consultancy Mysteel said in a note on Wednesday. Chinese smelters who take material from this merchant should be able to use their existing inventory, while traders could re-route cargoes due to arrive at the Qinhuangdao site to other destinations, it said.

Categories
Entertainment

The Sandman: ingenious TV that will inspire an entire generation of goths | Neil Gaman

Nothing lets me know I’m in for a week of tedious emails like being tasked to write about a big-budget fantasy series for this fun TV column. So it is with a heavy heart that I must announce that I have watched The Sandman (available now on Netflix), the Netflix x Warner x DC crossover event of the summer. Do you feel it, sire? A disturbance in the email realm. It can’t be – no! Thousands of people who still have DVD collections are yelling at me in unison about lore!

Anyway, you can stop telling me which subreddits I need to subscribe to, or what arcane maps I need to get out of the library, because I actually like this one. I have a potted history with fantasy television: we had a lot of it a couple of years ago, almost all of it bad, because they ignored the two primary rules for fantasy that I have made up and never actually bothered to tell anybody. Those rules are: good fantasy should ask the question “What if this thing happened? That’d be weird, wouldn’t it?” then set out some uneasy rules to govern that weirdness. That’s it. With that canvas stretched taut, you can tell intriguing human stories over the top of it. What if every man on Earth died in an event? What if a supernatural cabal actually ran the government but started getting nosebleeds and died? What if a book could predict the future? You can paint a vivid world that tells interesting stories from many angles, or you can have a character who is basically on a road trip looking for some golden trinket that magically solves everything, and stretch that story out for exactly as long as the studio is willing to fund it. The former is a lot rarer than the latter, sadly, and culturally we are poorer for it. Anyway, I’m not here to kick Westworld season 4 again.

We should talk about The Sandman though, which is good – possibly very good, and edging on very, very good. It helps that there is rich source material to pull from – a 75-volume comic series, an 11-hour audio adaptation, all coming from Neil Gaiman, who knows how to tell a good goth story – and one that has wisely resisted adaptation thus far. We meet Dream, an endless being older than the gods, who gets captured for 100 years by Charles Dance. While that is happening, his sleepy realm crumbles, and starts to affect the waking world. Jenna Coleman is bouncing around doing something cockney. Stephen Fry does a really good Stephen Fry. There’s a raven that can talk. Boyd Holbrook is having an awful lot of fun playing the Corinthian, a devilish nightmare with teeth instead of eyes. GGwendoline Christie is obviously – perfectly! – Lucifer, the ruler of hell. Dream’s various siblings – Death, Desire, Despair – are whirring around him like little cogs. David Thewlis is, and there’s actually no other way of saying this, “really Thewlissing”.

But two key decisions make The Sandman stand out. As you can probably tell from above, the casting is spectacular. But there’s a great balance of those serious spit-when-they-talk actors alongside light-touch British comedians who temper some of the more po-faced storylines (Asim Chaudhry and Sanjeev Bhaskar, as Cain and Abel, are excellent against Dream’s Tom Sturridge who is very good – and doomed to inspire the sartorial decisions of an entire generation of goths – but playing the whole thing very seriously). This helps too because a lot of the scenes are, well, just a load of computer rendering talking to itself – you can’t really do “gates the height of heaven that lead to a realm of dreams” on a soundstage, can you? – and actors with that levity about them stop it from feeling too soulless. At no point do you think: I am watching a person who is talking to a tennis ball.

Second, while there is a fair amount of “I must go into hell and ask about my helm” trinket-getting, that’s not the only thing going on, and my two favorite episodes were standalone stories within a richer gods-and-monsters world . These two episodes – one set in a diner, one set in the same pub at hundred-year intervals – really show what you can do with one story and one character and one hour of ingenuity, and give the whole series more of an anthology feel than an endless story where someone does hand gestures a lot and magic comes out. I know you’ve been hurt before. I have all the emails to provide it. But here is a modern fantasy series that is worth investing your time in.

Categories
Sports

Adelaide pre-season camp, Don Pyke apologises, ex-coach’s role, Eddie Betts, Josh Jenkins, Bryce Gibbs claims

Adelaide pre-season camp, Don Pyke apologises, ex-coach's role, Eddie Betts, Josh Jenkins, Bryce Gibbs claims

Former Adelaide coach Don Pyke has apologized for the 2018 pre-season camp amid growing scrutiny of his role in it, as players continue to speak out.

On Saturday Bryce Gibbs joined Josh Jenkins and Eddie Betts as past Adelaide players opening up on their disturbing experiences.

Gibbs backed up Jenkins and Betts’ claims, including about counselors asking the players for personal information which was then used to abuse them during camp rituals.

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Jenkins revealed during the now-infamous ‘harness’ incident he asked Pyke and Crows development manager Heath Younie why it was taking place, telling them “we lost a game of footy (the 2017 Grand Final), we are all good people, this is rubbish and I think we should all leave”.

Crows higher-ups have also been criticized for their handling of the camp fall-out, with Jenkins claiming the club told players it had signed confidentiality agreements on their behalf, and that after Indigenous players’ reaction to the camp, it was suggested they as a group would be excluded from the leadership program.

The Herald Sun’s Mark Robinson wrote this weekend: “Coach Don Pyke, who was on the camp and surely aware of the distress and distrust growing within his playing group, needed to be better.

“I needed to stop it. Someone had to and he was coach.”

Buddy likely to stay in Sydney? | 00:35

Now a Swans assistant, Pyke delivered an apology while speaking to media at Melbourne Airport on Saturday.

“To Josh and Eddie and the Adelaide players and staff who were involved, I apologize for the camp. It’s saddened me to see they’re feeling that way. I acknowledge the hurt and I’m sorry,” he said.

“I’ve been in contact with both of them, haven’t had a chance to speak to them yet but have spoken to a couple of the other guys. Clearly it’s a sad time for us all. I’ll reach out to some other guys in the next couple of days.

“Clearly we’re always reflecting, there’s a couple of components there – firstly with Eddie and Josh, the fact they feel personal information they provided was used against them, that’s disappointing and unacceptable. I’m saddened by that, sorry for that.

“Clearly we entered as I’ve said before, a space to improve from a performance viewpoint. And that space had some challenges and we got it wrong, that has to be acknowledged. Whether it was our planning, whether it was our assessment, the execution or the follow-up or the debriefing following the events of the camp, clearly it was an error and I’ve apologized to the playing group before and I apologise again.

“I respect Eddie and Josh for speaking out and saying their piece about how they felt about the camp. It’s put it on the agenda and on the table for discussion. It’s important we have the discussion to try and deal with the issues that arise from that.

“If there’s still people with ongoing issues we support them and we try and actually move on from this. It’s a challenging time for all of us but one that we’ll hopefully get through.”

Pyke was also asked whether he believed his role in the camp would impact his chances of getting another senior coaching role, such as at GWS, but said that it was “for others” to discuss.

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Categories
Australia

Murdoch University scientists discover “The Gentleman” may have lived in Australia

Murdoch University scientists discover “The Gentleman” may have lived in Australia

Perth scientists have breathed life into a decades-old German mystery of an unknown man’s body found floating in the North Sea, using the adage “you are what you eat” to discover he may be from Australia.

The man, dubbed “The Gentleman” by investigators in 1994 after his body was found by police off the coast of the Helgoland, a German archipelago, was weighed down by cast iron cobbler’s feet.

He earned The Gentleman nickname due to his smart clothing; a wool tie, British-made shoes, French-made trousers and a long-sleeve blue dress shirt.

Australian scientists may have helped solve the mystery of

Australian scientists may have helped solve the mystery of “The Gentleman.”Credit:Murdoch University

The case has baffled German police for 28 years, but criminologists and forensic scientists from Murdoch University may have helped to unravel the mystery after they ran new tests.

They found the man spent most of his life in Australia. Investigators in the 1990s determined he was 45 to 50 years old.

The discovery marks the last day of Australia’s National Missing Person’s Week on Saturday.

Scientists made the discovery by following the principle of “you are what you eat”, performing an isotope ratio analysis of The Gentleman’s bones.

Differences in climate, soil and human activity across the globe change the isotopic compositions of food, water and even dust – reflected in the isotopic compositions of human tissue.

Analysis showed the man likely spent most of his life in Australia.

Categories
US

37-year-old woman arrested in fiery wreck near Los Angeles that killed 5

37-year-old woman arrested in fiery wreck near Los Angeles that killed 5

A 37-year-old woman is facing vehicular manslaughter charges in connection with a fiery wreck near Los Angeles Thursday afternoon that left five people dead, including a pregnant woman and a child.

California Highway Patrol said Friday that Nicole Lorraine Linton was behind the wheel of a Mercedes-Benz sedan when it sped through a red light and slammed into several vehicles in Windsor Hills, a neighborhood southeast of downtown LA

Linton remains hospitalized with moderate injuries and has been arrested on suspicion of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, CHP said. Her case is being forwarded to the LA County District Attorney’s Office.

“Our office is in close contact with the lead law enforcement agency investigating,” the district attorney’s office said in a statement. “A prosecutor has already been assigned and will be working with law enforcement throughout the weekend. We will provide updates as more information becomes available. The case could be presented to us as early as Monday.”

The violent crash was captured on security video. Multiple people were ejected and two vehicles were engulfed in flames, CHP said.

The car was going at least 50 mph as it raced through the crowded intersection, CHP Officer Franco Pepi said.

Multiple people were killed in a fiery crash near a Windsor Hills gas station at the intersection of West Slauson and South La Brea avenues
Officials investigate a fiery crash where multiple people were killed near Los Angeles on Aug. 4, 2022.

(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images)


The coroner’s office Friday identified one of the deceased victims as Asherey Ryan, a 23-year-old pregnant woman. Her unborn child was listed as “baby boy Ryan” in online coroner’s records. Two other women and a man, as well as a boy, were killed but their names were not made public.

Pepi said eight others were hurt, including Linton. The other victims had minor injuries and included a 33-year-old woman and six children ranging in age from 13 months old to 15 years old, Pepi said.

CHP said Friday that “due to extensive fire damage, it is unknown at this time the make and model of the involved vehicles and which vehicle the involved parties were traveling in.”

A memorial grew outside the intersection Friday, as mourners left flowers and candles in memory of the dead.

Henry Sanchez, who works at nearby Sinclair Gas, was at the indoor register when he heard “the loudest noise I’ve ever heard.”

“The sound of it, it was gut-wrenching,” he told The Associated Press on Friday. “It was like two trains hitting each other, metal on metal.”

He saw people rush to the cars to offer aid but they were kept back by the flames until firefighters arrived.

“I remember everybody trying to get the fire down and help people out as much as they could, but nobody could do anything,” he said.

Another witness to the crash, Veronica Esquivel, told KTLA-TV that a baby was ejected from the vehicle and landed near her.

“All of the sudden, a baby literally flew from the middle of the intersection to the middle of the gas station and landed right on the floor in front of me,” Esquival said. “One of the workers came and saw me with the baby and took the baby out of my hands. … Somebody tried to resuscitate the baby but the baby was gone.”

Debra Jackson told CBS Los Angeles she was about to get out of her car to pump gas when she heard a big explosion.

“The flames just went over everybody,” Jackson said. “The flames went over my whole car and they told me to jump out of my car … because I was trying to get out of my car, to go to the gas pump. And I jumped out of my car and just left my car sitting right there.”

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Categories
Business

Jack Dorsey touts ‘most powerful’ aspect of Block-Afterpay partnership

Jack Dorsey touts 'most powerful' aspect of Block-Afterpay partnership

Afterpay is contributing 10 per cent of Block’s second-quarter gross profit of $US1.47 billion, which was up 29 per cent year-on-year. It ended up paying 47 per cent less for Afterpay than initially intended, after Block shares fell between the time the scrip deal was announced last August at $US29 billion and the close at the end of January, when shares offered to Afterpay investors were worth $ US13.9 billion.

Block shares are down 29 per cent this calendar year but were up almost 18 per cent this past week anticipating a strong second-quarter result. Block said on Friday its EBITDA for the quarter was $US187 million, down 48 per cent on the previous second quarter, but above expectations. Bitcoin was a drag on performance.

Shares fell about 7 per cent in after-hours trading in the US and opened down the same amount on the ASX at $117.24.

Bad debts fall

As analysts pushed for detail on cost reductions, credit quality and the focus on profitability, given macroeconomic headwinds, Mr Dorsey highlighted Afterpay’s “discovery capabilities”. He pointed to a new Cash App “discover” tab, based on Afterpay’s “shop directory”, that was key to driving its exponential growth in Australia. Mr Dorsey said this would help Americans work out where to shop and drive incremental sales to Square.

“We will continue to increase our customers’ ability to discover new products and services within the Cash App and also make it easier for sellers to turn on these features, so they can make more sales,” he said.

Block said Afterpay’s bad debts as a proportion of sales had failed over the quarter while overall sales using the service were higher. Over the second quarter, Afterpay contributed $US208 million of revenue and $US150 million of gross profit, down 2 per cent year-on-year.

Quarterly sales on Afterpay of $US5.3 billion was up 13 per cent year-on-year but softer than expected in the US as spending continued to shift from online to in-store, where Afterpay is underweight. Growth was strong in Australia where spending using Afterpay is more diversified.

Bad debts were 1.02 per cent of sales, better than the 1.17 per cent in the first quarter, as it tightened credit criteria. “We continue to see healthy consumer repayment behaviour, with 95 per cent of installations made on time,” said CFO Amrita Ahuja.

Overall transaction, loan and consumer receivable losses were $157 million, up 225 per cent year-on-year as Afterpay was added to the company. Block said loss rates were consistent with historical ranges, despite rising interest rates in the US. “We will continue to monitor trends closely given the dynamic macro environment,” it said.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Daniel Perlin said the second-quarter numbers “showed solid net revenue, gross profit and adjusted EBITDA against our and the street’s expectations, partially driven by execution in its strategic priorities of growing upmarket with larger merchants, expanding internationally, and building out more omnichannel capabilities”.

“While this is encouraging, we note a material deceleration in [sales using] Cash App,” Mr Perlin said.

While Cash App’s total revenue of $US2.6 billion was down 21 per cent year-on-year, this was driven by volatility in bitcoin. Total net revenue of $US4.4 billion in the second quarter was down 6 per cent year over year and missed expectations, also because of the decrease in bitcoin revenue as users shied away from the volatile cryptocurrency.

‘Super app’ goals

Cash App’s 47 million active users was up 18 per cent. Mr Dorsey said the market should focus on “connections” and “discovery” between retailers and see Afterpay as much as a referral and engagement tool as a financial product.

“This gets to the heart of exactly why we made the acquisition of Afterpay in the first place: we believe that Cash App can ultimately drive a tonne of discovery for merchants all around the world, but especially around local merchants [including] products and services that people would not otherwise have had a signal around,” Mr Dorsey said.

He pointed to aspirations to become a “super app”, distinguishing Cash App from other buy now, pay later players focused mostly on an installation product that is now being mimicked by banks all over the world and other tech players such as Apple. Cash App also offers Cash App Pay and Cash App Loans.

“We believe Cash App ultimately becomes a place you want to check not on a weekly basis but every single day because it consistently gives a good sense of your friends and family, the businesses around you, products and services you are interested in and offers such as Boost all in one place,” Mr Dorsey said. (Boost is a Cash App feature allowing users to round up spending to invest in stocks or bitcoin.)

Block presented a relatively upbeat view of the resilience of the American consumer in the face of the US inflation outbreak, especially discretionary spending. Square’s food and drink vertical delivered the strongest gross profit growth of any vertical over the past five years, it said, and sales from its restaurant sellers more than doubled year-on-year.

Analysts on the conference call pushed for detail on Block’s credit risk and spending discipline. Other buy now, pay later players such as Zip are also being forced by markets towards profitability. Block cut its operating expenditure by $450 million in the first six months and is restricting new hiring. “We are very mindful of profitability and demonstrating discipline here,” Ms Ahuja said.

“Of course, we have to balance that with large market opportunity and taking share gains at a time customers need us. We are continuing to invest given the vast opportunity we have seen. But we also recognize the environment has changed, and we are prepared to adapt and will maintain discipline by pulling back on some of discretionary operating expenses.

“We are focused on demonstrating greater near term profitability as we head into what could be a more volatile macro environment.”

To which JPMorgan’s analyst replied: “That is clear and encouraging.”

The second-quarter loss attributable to stockholders was $US208 million, which was affected by $US57 million of amortization of acquired intangible assets, including some relating to Afterpay, a $US36 million bitcoin impairment loss, and $US17 million in Afterpay deal and integration -related expenses.

As of June 30, the fair value of Block’s bitcoin investment was $U160 million, $US47 million greater than the carrying value of the investment after impairment charges as the price of the improved cryptocurrency.