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🗞️ The World Cup
The World Cup officially started on Thursday last week; however it came to life on Sunday at 2:27 pm.
Pick & Scroll News
June 15, 2026
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Good morning. The World Cup officially started on Thursday last week; however it came to life on Sunday at 2:27 pm.
Socceroo Nestory Irankunda put Australia into a 1-0 lead against Türkiye before Connor Metcalfe sealed the game in the second half.
Expect work productivity to take a dive this week with games on every day. However, Australia will next be on your screen against one of the hosts, the USA, at 5am on Saturday. A win would seal a birth in the next round. Yiew!!
All the headlines and more below...
AUSTRALIA BANNED UNDER-16S FROM SOCIAL MEDIA SIX MONTHS AGO. 78% ARE STILL ON IT.
Six months into Australia's first-in-world social media ban for under-16s, eSafety reports a 37% drop in kids holding accounts. It also reports that 78% of children who had accounts before the ban are still using them. Many were never asked to age verify.
78% of under-16s still access banned platforms, down from 84% before the law passed.
No platform has been fined. eSafety is investigating Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube for letting kids who failed age checks retry until they passed. The regulator has no way to currently trigger a fine. Its only successful action was a three-year case against X that ended with the company paying $650K. X is valued at $47B.
More than a dozen countries are copying it anyway. Canada introduced its own bill this week. The European Commission flagged a proposal for northern summer. Britain is weighing whether to ban or just restrict addictive features. The Trump administration now treats foreign regulation of American tech companies as an unfair trade barrier.
AUSTRALIAN NEWS
Australia was the first country to ban under 16s from social media, and now other governments are assessing its effectiveness amid evidence of easy age-verification workarounds. LINK
Australian business investment has surged to become the largest contributor to economic growth in the March quarter, as firms boost spending on machinery and equipment to lift productivity and living standards. LINK
KPMG PULLED AN AI REPORT FULL OF AI HALLUCINATIONS
KPMG published a study on AI adoption filled with fake case studies flagged as AI hallucinations. UBS, NHS, Swiss Federal Railways, Transport for London, all called out claims about their AI use as factually incorrect or misleading. The report was pulled after GPTZero verified the errors.
The study claimed UBS runs AI agents across investment advisory and compliance via a platform "co-developed with Microsoft."
This is the second Big Four firm caught this way in a month, EY retracted a study in February over fake footnotes. KPMG said it expects "human oversight to validate content." The firm markets itself as an adviser on responsible AI adoption and has pumped out hundreds of thought leadership pieces to win consulting work.
The report was distributed across multiple countries with local sales contacts attached.
COMPANY NEWS
KPMG has withdrawn an October AI report after research group GPTZero and the FT found it contained AI-generated hallucinations about organisations including UBS, the NHS and major European transit groups. LINK
Westpac has broken with rival banks by forecasting the RBA will deliver 2 more cash rate hikes to above 4.35% in 2026 as stubborn inflation persists. LINK
SpaceX completed the biggest IPO in history, raising more than US$75B as its shares jumped nearly 20%, valuing the company at about US$2.1T and making Elon Musk the first trillionaire. LINK
Dollarama is pushing ahead with a major overhaul of The Reject Shop it bought for US$259M in mid 2025, importing its products and planning eventual rebranding. LINK
The federal government has almost 300 active contracts worth $653M with KPMG as the firm faces ASIC scrutiny and a parliamentary inquiry into alleged audit integrity breaches. LINK
Foxtel has proposed a 7-year NRL broadcast deal worth about $4B that would centralise rights, split free-to-air games between Seven and Ten and keep exclusive streaming on Kayo. LINK
Westpac director Peter Nash has sat in on audit tender pitch meetings and questioned KPMG, EY and Deloitte, despite the bank telling parliament he was not involved due to conflict concerns. LINK
Monash IVF cut its FY26 underlying net profit after tax guidance to US$17M-US$18M as Australian ART cycle volumes fell 4.7% while its market share rose to 20.1%. LINK
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CHART OF THE DAY
If you have the type AB+, you have the luxury of being able to accept all blood types, where as somebody with O- are severely restricted, only actually able to receive O- blood making for very high demand for O- donors.
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