WSJ What’s News - Australia Confronts Rising Antisemitic Violence After Shooting

Episode Date: December 15, 2025

A.M. Edition for Dec. 15. Australia’s prime minister Anthony Albanese is vowing tougher gun laws after a father and son targeted a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney, killing 15 people.    Plus, Chileans elected their most right-wing president since the end of Pinochet’s brutal military dictatorship in 1990, giving President Trump another South American ally. And Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite company SpaceX launches a Wall Street bake-off to hire banks for a possible IPO next year. Luke Vargas hosts. Sign up for the WSJ’s free What’s News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Published by Capital Client Group, Inc. Gunmen in Australia kill 15 people at a Hanukkah event in Sydney, the country's worst mass shooting in nearly 30 years. I'm walking home and I'm looking at people differently and I'm like, I don't know if I trust you anyone. I'm scared of anyone that I don't know. And that's just such a horrible feeling because we're such a tight community. Plus, we'll review more bad economic data out of China and SpaceX. shops for banks ahead of a possible IPO next year. It's Monday, December 15th. I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal, and here is the AM edition of What's News, the top headlines and

business stories moving your world today. Authorities in Australia are treating yesterday's killing of 15 people at a Hanukkah event on Sydney's Bondi Beach as a terrorist attack. Authorities said the shooting, which was carried out by a father and his son was designed to target Sydney's Jewish community. And speaking this morning, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the suspects were driven by an extreme perversion of Islam, but had acted alone, stressing that investigations are continuing. Despite its reputation as a model for multiculturalism, a spate of anti-Semitic attacks, including the firebombing of a synagogue in Melbourne last year, have marred Australia's legacy as a haven for Jews. The shooting

is also kicking off a push to toughen firearms regulations in a country where gun violence is rare, with Albanese saying there should be limits on the number of guns licensed to one person and the periodic review of those licenses. People's circumstances change. People can be radicalized over a period of time. Licenses should not be in perpetuity. The father accused of being involved in the shooting had six firearms licensed to him, which were found at the scene and used in the attack, according to police. He was eligible for a firearms license for recreational hunting and was also

a member of a gun club. Meanwhile, the manhunt continues for a suspect in Saturday's shooting at Brown University, which left two people dead and nine injured at the Ivy League College. The FBI detained a person of interest yesterday, but later said there wasn't enough evidence to prosecute them. Providence's mayor has appealed for help in its investigation, adding that it's not clear if the perpetrator remained in the city or had fled. Hong Kong's High Court has convicted Jimmy Lai of violating the Chinese territory's national security law, a verdict which could see the media tycoon spend the rest of his life in prison. Lai is the founder of the Apple Daily newspaper, which angered Beijing with its relentless

criticism of China's ruling Communist Party and its support for protest movements in Hong Kong. Earlier this year, President Trump said he'd do everything he could to free the 78-year-old Lai who's become a symbol of Chinese political persecution. Lai was also convicted on the lesser charge of violating Hong Kong's sedition law with a sentencing to take place at a later date. Chileans have elected their most right-wing president in a generation with hardline conservative Jose Antonio Cast winning easily over a Communist Party rival on a promise to crack down on crime and illegal immigration.

Speaking to supporters in Santiago, Kass said he'd work to improve security and boost economic growth. Some say you have the easy solution for everything. No, it's very difficult, but it should be clarified that it's not something that happens overnight. We're going to have a tough year, very tough,

because the finances are not in good shape. The victory for Kast gives President Trump another ally in the region following an election win for a center-right leader in Bolivia and midterm elections that solidified the leadership of Argentina's president, Javier Milay. Coming up, Chinese exports are soaring, but as we'll hear, the good economic news ends there. That story and more, including SpaceX's IPO plans after the break. Canada's Wonderland is bringing the holiday magic this season with Winterfest on select nights.

now through January 3rd, step into a winter wonderland filled with millions of dazzling lights, festive shows, rides, and holiday treats. Plus, Coca-Cola is back with Canada's kindness community, celebrating acts of kindness nationwide with a chance at 100,000 donation for the winning community and a 2026 holiday caravan stop. Learn more at canadaswunderland.com. Chinese stocks closed lower today following the release of a raft of economic data that showed the world's second largest economy is deteriorating on several fronts. Hanna Miao covers the Chinese economy for the Wall Street Journal and has

been combing through the November figures today. Hannah, there's a lot here. I'm curious, what stands out to you? We're seeing a pretty broad-based slowdown and economic momentum in China, continued declines in fixed asset investment, which is investment in things like buildings, machinery equipment, that sort of thing. Another notable metric is that China's retail sales growth slowed to its lowest level since 2022. So we're definitely seeing a pretty sharp slowdown in consumer spending growth. And overall, there's no signs of recovery in the property market, which has been weighing on China's economy for many years. We're seeing home prices, continue to fall and property investment continue to deteriorate as well.

And on that exact point, we learned today another of China's massive real estate companies is in trouble. China's real estate market slowdown has been a major problem in the economy in the last few years. And it's definitely related to consumer spending because most Chinese people hold the majority of their household wealth in property. So when you see property, prices down this much, it really makes people feel like, you know, their nest eggs are contracting and they are worried about their financial futures. So it can weigh on this consumer sentiment. So this is a major point that economists have been calling on Chinese policymakers to address and remains to be seen when we'll see the property market fully bottom.

Okay, so economists hoping to see some policy intervention, including we've heard from the head of the IMF, saying China's too big to be relying just on exports for growth. He wants Beijing to take greater action to shift towards domestic consumption. But we've been hearing that for years, Hannah. Could we be actually nearing an inflection point where we see that? We saw recently at a conference for economic policy that leaders have vowed to boost domestic demand. in the coming year. It's definitely been identified as a policy priority, but we haven't seen a lot of needle-moving actions so far. And that's because Chinese policymakers have typically preferred to adjust their economic initiatives based on supply side actions, and they're not really keen to do the kinds of handouts that might be more familiar to us in the U.S., such as stimulus checks those kinds of things. So it remains to be seen how this will play out in the coming year and coming years, but the pressure is certainly on for policymakers to shore up consumer

and business demand. And that's especially because China's exports have been extremely strong empowering the economy this year. But it's been adding to trade tensions, obviously the U.S. has imposed hefty tariffs on Chinese goods. The European Union has warned against this influx of exports from China. So it certainly has been raising global geopolitical tensions, and that is putting a limit on just how much China can rely on exports to boost its economy. That's why there could be more efforts to focus on the domestic. issues at hand, like consumer spending, like investments and business demand. That was China economics reporter Hannah Miao in Singapore.

Hannah, thanks, as always, for the update. Thanks for having me. SpaceX could soon initiate countdown on going public. We're exclusively reporting that the Elon Musk-led rocket and satellite maker has started interviewing investment banks and has told employees that a listing in the new year could raise a significant amount of capital. Wall Street's top banks will submit initial pitches to oversee the process this week in what's known as a bake-off. The move has surprised some people at the more than 20-year-old company, which has become an essential contractor for the U.S. government.

The company says that an IPO timeline remains highly uncertain. Earlier this month, the journal reported that SpaceX is also pursuing a secondary share sale that would value the company at roughly $800 billion, up from $400 billion this summer. Over the past year, companies have poured trillions of dollars into AI investments, and CEOs planned to spend even more in 2026. Advisory firm Teneo surveyed 350 bosses from public companies, with two-thirds saying they would boost spending, even though the majority of current AI projects are running at a loss.

AI use was most successful in marketing and customer service, while respondents said there were challenges using it in higher risk areas such as security, legal, and human resources. And if you ask Ajay Rajadex, who heads up research at Barclays, the U.S. is in the middle of the single biggest industrial investment since World War II. There's no question that it has supported the economy by our estimate just AI spending added 1% to U.S. growth this year. The other place where it mattered is virtually all of the support for the equity market has come from AI heavy names. They have driven about 80 to 90 percent of the equity market's returns. And that has supported the wealth effect, which has supported consumption. When consumers in the United States

feel richer, they spend more. So if the AI narrative hits a wall, there's no question in my mind that the U.S. economy starts to go perilously close to recession. And if you want to learn more about AI's impact on the economy, check out Aceh's interview on the latest episode of WSJ's Take On the Week, wherever you get your podcasts. And iRobot, the company behind Roomba vacuums, has filed for bankruptcy following years of financial strain and foreign competition. Don't worry, though, your Roomba is safe, for now at least. Irobot has assured customers that app support and product functions will continue while the company restructures. The company's stock dropped sharply last year after a...

a proposed sale to Amazon fell through over regulatory concerns. And that's it for what's news for this Monday morning. Today's show was produced by Hattie Moyer and Daniel Bach. Our supervising producer is Sandra Kilhoff, and I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with the new show. Until then, thanks for listening.