Tim Treadgold

ANALYSIS: It’s not often that hyperbole merges with reality when it comes to resources, but WA’s gold sector has just thrown conventional wisdom out the window.

Any complacency on behalf of Australia’s banks may be ratcheted down a notch as some concerning practices are investigated.

Perth’s importance as a national business centre may have faded during recent months, but it’s a different matter in the inner suburb of West Perth, where several small mining companies have sprung back to life.

South Australia’s push for renewable energy is an experiment worth watching for the other states.

ANALYSIS: CBH has served WA grain growers for more than 80 years, but debate is raging about whether now is the time to kill the co-op.

To most people it seems inconceivable that a bank would pay its customers to borrow money, but that scenario was played out, albeit briefly, in Denmark last year, when homebuyers were on the winning side of negative interest rates.

Some ill-advised business decisions are coming back to haunt some of well-known local resources players.

ANALYSIS: Rubbery figures and projections aside, WA’s iron ore miners are breathing a little easier thanks to improving prices and a favourable exchange rate.

Living life in reverse is an amusing fictional concept that involves being born old and growing young, but if you look at some of the forces at work in the economy today you might imagine that everything is running backwards – starting with the puzzle of negative interest rates.

Healthy employees bring obvious benefits to the workplace, but how their personal medical details are used may have unintended consequences.

It’s likely more nickel operations will need to be closed before there’s any improvement in prices for the steel-making commodity.

The technology bubble that has inflated share prices around the world hasn’t burst, but it has certainly lost a lot of air and credibility.

Global retailers provided a rare bright spot in an otherwise subdued sector over Christmas, and the dominance of the online model is set to grow.

The contrasting fortunes of the Bunnings and Masters hardware businesses reflect the broader performance of their relative corporate owners.

You probably wouldn’t believe it if someone told you that Perth-based retailing specialist Wesfarmers was bigger than global resources leader BHP Billiton, but that was the situation last week on the Australian Securities Exchange as the company led by Richard Goyder quietly slipped past the global mining giant.

Deflationary pressures are causing concern for central bankers worldwide.

If Woodside Petroleum is ever looking for a corporate slogan it could borrow a saying from the Dutch philosopher Erasmus: “in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king”.

Sports, politics and business do not share a lot in common but there is one feature that links all three – and that's how a single event can turn a winner into a loser in the blink of an eye.

The Dick Smith chain of technology and electrical goods shops is probably a poor example of the wider problems confronting retailing but its collapse this week is a reminder that the shake-out which has rattled the retail world over the past few years is far from over.

Canny investors would be well advised to plan for the worst and hope for the best as 2016 bears down on us.

Bank bashing is an old sport usually practised by external critics, but 2016 could be the year when big banks discover that their greatest threat comes from within – something that should concern bank shareholders as much as employees.

Traditional businesses were slow to wake up to the threat posed by disrupters such as Uber and Airbnb, but they’re now warned and should prepare for further assaults.

Mining and debt have always been a deadly combination, especially for investors, but toss in a stiff dose of politics and you have a brew infinitely more volatile for everyone, including government.

Bell Group has been in the news recently, which is an apt reminder of the downside of debt, considering the state of play in the resources sector.

At first glance there does not seem to be much connecting Gina Rinehart with Clive Palmer, but a closer look reveals a common thread … made of steel.

A US court ruling concerning the controversial Simandou iron ore project in West Africa is a worry for Rio Tinto, but not WA.

It is one of the most overused quotes of all time, but if you look at the old and the new of Western Australia’s mining industry it is impossible to avoid thinking about the first words in Charles Dickens’ novel, A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times”.

Iron ore producers, and the WA economy, need to prepare for more sluggish demand from China if the findings of a major investment bank are accurate.

If news from the science and banking communities proves to be as promising as it sounds, a new business opportunity is brewing that promises to be as disruptive and profitable as the early years of mobile phones – while also derailing a century-old government service.

Expect fireworks at the Australian leg of BHP Billiton’s annual meeting process, to be held in Perth this week.

’Tis the season to be gloomy, that much we know from following financial markets; but an early nominee for the Dr Gloomy prize of the season goes to former ANZ Bank chief economist, Saul Eslake, who said earlier this week that the China-driven mining boom was “the last in human history”.

Some of the Gorgon gas project’s major backers are warily eyeing prices as the project nears production.