When to expect your 20% HECS-HELP debt relief
When you can expect your HECS-HELP debt to be slashed, teens to be slugged $192 annually for Snapchat memories, and the reform set to leave young Aussies $6000 richer in retirement. Here are five things you may have missed this week.
HECS debt relief: key dates to know
The weeks ahead will see millions of Australians have their student debt scaled back by 20%.
The 20% reduction will be rolled-out in stages.
Most reductions will be applied before the end of 2025 though the Tax Office says complex cases may not be completed until early 2026.
The reduction to study and training support loans will be backdated to June 1, 2025, before indexation was applied.
This will see indexation on student debt re-calculated, and any excess indexation will be credited back to your loan.
Federal Minister for Education Jason Clare says the average student debt of $27,600 will be cut by $5520.
It's good news for the almost 3 million people who have a HECS-HELP debt.
The reduction in student debt comes as record numbers of Australians embark on university studies.
Last year 388,890 Aussie students started a degree course, up 4% on the year before.
Even more started a degree this year, and Clare expects still more to commence a degree in 2026.
Shout out to parents of teens - Snapchat to charge for memories
Australia's 8 million-plus Snapchat users are about to pay for the storage of their photos.
It's a call out to mums and dads to brace for financial pain because Snapchat is a favourite among teens, with the platform currently reaching 80% of 13-24 year olds in Australia.
To date, Snapchat has been free to use, relying on advertising for much of its revenue.
But this week saw cloud storage plans and a monthly fee announced by Snapchat's parent company - Snap, for its popular Memories feature.
'Snapchatters' with less than 5GB of Memories, won't experience any change.
But for serious Snapchatters needing 5TB of storage (that's a lot of photos), the cost will be $15.99 each month - or about $192 annually.
On the plus side, Snapchat will provide 12 months of temporary storage for Memories that exceed the 5GB limit before charges are introduced.
The big change set to leave young Aussies $6000 richer in retirement
This week saw legislation introduced to parliament that will ensure super is paid on time.
The 'payday super' reforms require employer-paid super contributions to be paid each payday instead of quarterly.
The legislation will take effect from July 1, 2026, and it's expected to benefit the retirement incomes of millions of Australians. That's because more frequent super contributions grow and compound over a working life.
As a guide, payday super is expected to leave the average 25-year-old $6000 better off in retirement.
The reforms also help to address the ongoing problem of unpaid super.
An estimated $5.2 billion worth of super went unpaid in 2020-2021 alone. It's an issue that chiefly impacts lower paid, casual and insecure workers, who are most likely to be women.
The investment that's attracted over 2 million Australians
Australians' love affair with exchange traded funds (ETFs) shows no signs of slowing.
This week saw the ETF market pass the $300 billion benchmark - coinciding with the launch on the ASX of the Global X S&P Australia GARP ETF (ticker: GRPA), the 400th ETF to be listed on the Aussie stock exchange.
The past year has seen investors pump an additional $80 billion into ETFs, with funds under management quadrupling over the last five years.
More than 2 million Australians now invest in ETFs - all eager to take advantage of diversified, transparent and accessible investment options.
Andrew Campion, ASX General Manager, Investment Products and Strategy, says, "We've seen extraordinary momentum across the ETF market, and investors are increasingly using ETFs to access a broad range of investment strategies and asset classes from international equities and fixed income through to alternatives."
Hope fades for Christmas rate cut - so make one of your own
It looks like the rate cut party has come to an end, for now at least.
NAB, ANZ and CommBank have all downgraded their forecasts, with none of these big banks expecting a rate cut this side of Christmas.
Westpac alone is predicting a 0.25% rate cut in time for the festive season.
The about-face in rate forecasts has been driven by an uptick in inflation - which the Reserve Bank is focused on keeping low.
But all is not lost.
Comparison site Mozo says a "quite a few lenders" have recently lowered variable home loan rates despite the Reserve keeping the cash rate on hold in September.
Westpac, for example, has introduced an online-only loan with a rate of 5.24% for owner occupiers.
It's not the lowest rate in town though.
Pacific Mortgage group and Homeloans360 are both offering a 5.14% variable rate to borrowers with a 20% deposit.
For even bigger savings, Mozo reports several lenders with fixed rates well below 5%.
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