Australians risk losing a huge amount in superannuation inheritance due to little-known tax rules. Older generations will transfer trillions of dollars in wealth to younger generations in the coming decades, with much of this money to come via superannuation and property assets.

Most families don’t realise that their kids could lose a third of their inheritance to superannuation tax. But Pivot Wealth financial adviser and Yahoo Finance contributor Ben Nash said this tax could be “completely avoidable” with a bit of strategy.

When someone passes away, their superannuation is split into two main parts: the tax-free component and the taxable component.

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If the money goes to adult kids or anyone who is not financially dependent on the person passing down the super, the taxable portion gets hit with a “death tax” of up to 32 per cent.

“On a $1 million balance, that means $320,000 that can be completely gone,” Nash explained.

The biggest component of most people’s super funds is the taxable component because it’s made up of any compulsory employment super contributions, salary sacrifice or tax-deductible contributions, and the growth and earnings on these funds.

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The good news is it is possible to reduce or avoid the tax altogether.

“The fix here is what’s called a withdrawal and recontribution strategy. It’s a pretty simple concept, although the rules are a little bit complicated,” Nash explained.

“Basically, while your parents are still alive and eligible, they can withdraw some or all of their super, pay no tax on the withdrawal, and then put it back into their super as a non-concessional or after-tax contribution.

“That shifts their super balance from taxable to completely tax-free. When you do that gradually over time, you can save literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in future tax.”

Your parents would need to be over the age of 60 and meet a condition of release (like retirement) so they can withdraw part of their super tax-free.

The rules around withdrawing and contributing to your super fund, along with how much you put in, are complicated, so it is important to get financial advice from a professional.

The Productivity Commission previously estimated that $3.5 trillion would be passed on from Aussies aged 60 and over by 2050. More recent JBWere figures put the figure at $5.4 trillion over the next 20 years.

A Finder survey of 1,017 people last year revealed 41 per cent of Aussies – equivalent to 8.8 million people – were anticipating receiving an inheritance.

One in 10 said they were depending on an inheritance to achieve major financial goals like buying a house or retiring, while nearly one in five anticipated it would significantly improve their financial situation but they weren’t depending on it.

While you are taking a closer look at your superannuation, it can also be worth making sure you have a binding death benefit nomination in place.

More than a third of people surveyed by Super Consumers Australia had no death benefit nomination with their super fund, while 25 per cent didn’t know if it was binding.

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Tech company Oracle (ORCL) said on Sunday that it planned to raise $45bn (£32.8bn) to $50bn in 2026 to fund the expansion of its cloud infrastructure business.

The company said that it planned to achieve this funding target using a combination of debt and equity financing.

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“Oracle is raising money in order to build additional capacity to meet the contracted demand from our largest Oracle Cloud Infrastructure customers, including AMD (AMD), Meta (META), Nvidia (NVDA), OpenAI, TikTok, xAI and others,” it said in a statement, according to a Reuters report.

Oracle (ORCL) shares hovered just below the flatline in pre-market trading on Monday morning and are trading 3.4% in the red over one year.

Media and entertainment giant Disney (DIS) was in focus on Monday morning, following a Bloomberg report that it was close to picking theme-park division chairman Josh D’Amaro as the company’s next CEO.

Read more: Commodities price slump drags markets lower

According to the Bloomberg report, Disney’s (DIS) board is aligning on promoting D’Amaro into the role and will vote on naming a new CEO in the coming week, citing people familiar with the matter. D’Amaro would take over from Bob Iger, who returned as CEO in 2022, having served in the role from 2005 to 2020.

Disney (DIS) had not responded to Yahoo Finance UK’s request for comment at the time of writing.

The company is set to report its fiscal first quarter earnings later in the day on Monday. Disney (DIS) shares hovered just below the flatline in pre-market trading on Monday morning and are 0.6% in the red over one year.

In Asia, shares in Hong Kong-listed electric vehicle (EV) company BYD slid 7.3% on Monday, after reporting a drop in sales in January.

BYD (1211.HK) said on Sunday that it had sold 210,051 vehicles in January, which was 30.1% lower than 300,538 it sold in the same period last year.

The company sold 83,249 battery electric vehicles last month, which was 33.6% lower than January last year and it delivered 122,269 plug-in hybrid EVs, down 28.5%.

Pharmaceuticals giant AstraZeneca (AZN.L) will begin trading its ordinary shares on New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on Monday for the first time.

AstraZeneca (AZN.L), which is listed on the UK’s FTSE 100 (^FTSE) and Sweden’s OMX Stockholm 30 (^OMX), previously had American depositary shares (ADS) listed on the Nasdaq (^IXIC).

Read more: Gold plunges below $5,000 amid broad sell-off

Michel Demaré, chair of AstraZeneca, said: “This will allow even more investors to participate in AstraZeneca’s future. Our harmonised listing across New York, London and Stockholm reflects strong shareholder support for our growth strategy and positions AstraZeneca to deliver more innovative medicines to more patients around the world.”

AstraZeneca’s (AZN.L) London-listed shares were up 1% on Monday morning.

On the London market, gold producer Endeavour Mining (EDV.L) was the biggest faller on the FTSE 100 (^FTSE), with shares slumping 7.2% at the time of writing.

The fall in Endeavour (EDV.L) shares was driven by a drop in gold (GC=F) prices, as well as other metals, adding to losses from Friday’s session, when US president Donald Trump named Kevin Warsh as his nomination for the new Federal Reserve chairman.

Read more: Stocks to watch this week: Alphabet, Amazon, Palantir, Novo Nordisk and Shell

Wealth Club chief investment strategist Susannah Streeter said: “The shock unravelling of prices demonstrates just how concerned investors had been about perceived attacks on the independence of the Federal Reserve.”

“There had been concerns that a Trump cheerleader would be installed at the central bank, which could lead to politically led decision-making, and risks of runaway inflation,” she said. “But now financial industry heavyweight Kevin Warsh has been anointed as successor, with deep Fed experience, he’s not expected to be a pushover and that’s sparked this big reversal of safe-haven positions.”

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AUSTIN, Texas, Feb. 1, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Oracle Corporation (NYSE: ORCL) today announced its full calendar year 2026 plan to fund the expansion of its rapidly growing Oracle Cloud Infrastructure business. Oracle is raising money in order to build additional capacity to meet the contracted demand from our largest Oracle Cloud Infrastructure customers, including AMD, Meta, NVIDIA, OpenAI, TikTok, xAI and others.

Oracle expects to raise $45 to $50 billion of gross cash proceeds during the 2026 calendar year.  The company plans to achieve its funding objective by using a balanced combination of debt and equity financing to maintain a solid investment-grade balance sheet.

On the equity side, Oracle plans to raise approximately half of its 2026 funding through a combination of equity-linked and common equity issuances. This is expected to include an initial issuance of mandatory convertible preferred securities, representing a modest portion of the overall equity funding, as well as a newly authorized at-the-market equity program of up to $20 billion. The company plans to issue equity from the at-the-market program flexibly over time at prevailing market prices, based on market conditions and capital needs.

On the debt side, Oracle intends to complete a single, one-time issuance of investment-grade senior unsecured bonds early in 2026 to cover the other half of the company’s planned funding for the year. Oracle does not expect to issue additional bonds during calendar year 2026 beyond this transaction.

This funding plan reflects Oracle’s commitment to maintaining an investment-grade rating, prudent capital allocation, balance sheet strength, and transparency with investors as the company continues to expand its Oracle Cloud Infrastructure business. These transactions have been approved by the Oracle Board of Directors.

Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC will be leading the senior unsecured bond offering, and Citigroup will be leading the at-the-market issuance and mandatory convertible preferred equity offering.

About Oracle
Oracle offers integrated suites of applications plus secure, autonomous infrastructure in the Oracle Cloud.

Trademarks
Oracle, Java, MySQL, and NetSuite are registered trademarks of Oracle Corporation. NetSuite was the first cloud company—ushering in the new era of cloud computing.

“Safe Harbor” Statement: This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding Oracle’s expected funding needs, anticipated credit ratings, capital markets transactions, and financing strategy. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied due to various risks and uncertainties. Among the factors that could cause actual results to differ are:  changes in the timing of any customer’s purchases or ability to fund its commitments; delays or development and/or operational problems with the construction of implementation of any of the data centers; and new or different commercial opportunities that cause the Company to reevaluate its near-term capital needs. Oracle undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements, except as required by law.

Oracle Corporation may file a registration statement (including a prospectus) with the SEC for the offering to which this communication relates. Before you invest, you should read the prospectus in that registration statement and other documents Oracle Corporation has filed with the SEC for more complete information about Oracle Corporation and this offering. You may get these documents for free by visiting EDGAR on the SEC website at www.sec.gov. Alternatively, you may obtain a copy by visiting www.oracle.com/investor, calling our Investor Relations Department at 1-650-506-4073, writing to Investor Relations Department, Oracle Corporation, 500 Oracle Parkway, Redwood City, California 94065 or sending an email to [email protected].

SOURCE Oracle