Daily Dispatches: Jobs growth in Sept, says ANZ survey

Job advertisements clocked up back-to-back monthly gains in September, providing yet more reason for the Reserve Bank to raise interest rates as demand in the economy picks up. The total number of jobs advertised increased 4.4 per cent in September up from a 4.1 per cent gain in August, according to the ANZ Bank's monthly survey. August's increase was the first gain in 16 months. (Sydney Morning Herald)

Only six months into his job as ANZ Bank's chief executive, the ugly saga of stockbroker Opes Prime broke and ANZ and Merrill Lynch had to sell, on behalf of their customers, tens of millions of dollars of share portfolios at bottom-of-the-market prices. And a string of similar cases followed. "I felt as though I walked into a buzzsaw, it was just one thing after another," Mr Smith said in China last week. (The Australian)

The last four remaining directors of the failed investment group Babcock & Brown are being investigated for a breach of the Corporations Act after resigning en masse from its board within weeks of the company going into administration. (The Age)