THE NEWS WRAP: Saputo reveals global ambitions in bidding war for Warrnambool

Lino Saputo Jr, the chief executive of Canadian food giant Saputo, has revealed his company’s growth ambitions extend beyond exports to Asia, as the bidding war for Warrnambool Cheese and Butter intensifies.

“Australia is a net exporting country. And so, if we are able to acquire milk at international levels and we’re able to process it into a number of different categories of products, not just powders, but powders could be very profitable as well,” he said.

“If we are able to manufacture cheeses and we’re able to manufacture a wide range of dairy products that are in high demand in these emerging markets, then it gives us an additional platform by which our sales folks can get out there and say, look we can offer you product from the United States, we can offer you product from Argentina and now we can offer you product from Australia.”

Good news in US jobs figures

In a good piece of economic news out of the US, new official figures show more than 200,000 jobs were created last month, despite the US government forecast.

The figure beat analysts’ forecasts of around 125,000 new jobs, suggesting the US economy was more robust in the face of the shutdown than some had feared.

The figures also show the unemployment rate rose to 7.3%, although this could be attributed to government workers being counted as jobless during the shutdown.

Coopers warns beer drinkers could turn to cask wine over excise increases

Coopers managing director Tim Cooper has warned the twice-a-year jump in the excise on beer threatens to drive a wedge between increasingly price sensitive consumers and their favourite amber ale.

“Our worry is now that beer is… an elastic commodity and consumers can shift to other products like cask wine,” Cooper said on Friday.

“We can’t just forever be increasing the price of beer and expecting people to keep on buying it in the same volumes.”

Overnight

The Dow Jones Industrial Average is up 1.08% to 15761.78. The Aussie dollar is down to US93.86 cents.