The Point for Australia/NZ

Research evidence excerpt

The Point for Australia/NZ

EBITDA with warmer weather and lower gas prices likely to weigh. However, with

forward swaps and cap prices having stabilised over the past month, we see

increasing upside risk to Energy Markets earnings from FY28 onwards.

Tom Wallington

Global

US Application Software - 2026 CFO Survey: Measured Optimism with Clear

Commitment to AI

Our July 2026 CFO survey indicates measured optimism as software spend

expectations moderated versus 2025, yet year-to-date budget revisions trended

positively. The defining theme is an unmistakable commitment to AI with the share

of organizations allocating 20%+ of budget to AI surging to 33% from 3% last year,

including 90%+ using/considering use across financial software categories. AI is

broadly expected to drive headcount reductions/automation, yet the anticipated

workforce impact appears to be tempering. Nearly all CFOs are actively monitoring

AI consumption with vendor/application-level tracking preferred over more

granular model/token-based metrics, while AI cost controls lean toward bundling

into existing licenses/routing to lower-cost models rather than imposing hard

caps. Underpinning all of this is a continued shift to public cloud, with 69% of

respondents expecting cloud spend to grow over the next 12 months. We view the

survey as most constructive for MSFT, NOW, AMZN, GOOGL, WDAY, BL, BILL, SGE

and XRO.

Steven Enders, CFA | Tyler Radke | Ronald Josey | Balajee Tirupati, CFA | Bryan Keane

Fund Flow Insights - Diverging gap between fund flows and performance

In the week of 29 July 2026, bond funds saw US$2.5bn inflow while equity funds

had US$63.7bn inflow. A US$30.4bn inflow came back to US funds while Global

funds continued to see US$9.8bn inflow. European funds, however, continued to