Variant Perception recently put out a report to the public about Australia, why the economy and currency are vulnerable and why the RBA is likely to cut rates further. The report has gathered a lot of attention from various official media outlets and blogs.

One of the world’s biggest commodity producers, BHP Billiton, recently got a lot of attention by suggesting that the so far insatiable Chinese demand for commodities may have come to an end. The argument is simple enough: the rate of growth in China is slowing. However, the implications for commodity exporters, such as Australia, who have invested dizzying sums of money in expanding capacity to reflect an ever higher increase in Chinese commodity hunger, may be very big indeed.