| Australian home prices plunge the most in 40 years. UN says China committed human rights abuses in Xinjiang. Warning: the "super bubble" in stocks is yet to pop. Here's what you need to know today. China's Communist Party congress next month will set the stage for the biggest reshuffle of the country's top economic roles in a decade. Premier Li Keqiang, economic czar Liu He, central bank Governor Yi Gang, banking regulator Guo Shuqing and Finance Minister Liu Kun are all likely to step down from their current positions by early next year, based on retirement age and term-limit norms for senior officials. One man likely going nowhere despite serving two terms and passing the usual retirement age is President Xi Jinping. But while he's thought to be on track for a precedent-defying third term, that doesn't mean he will necessarily rule for life. Here's why he might not make it past 2027. Australian home prices recorded their largest monthly decline in almost four decades in August, with rising interest rates expected to drive further falls this year and next. Sydney slid 2.3%, Melbourne dropped 1.2% and Brisbane fell 1.8%, CoreLogic said. The central bank is striving to raise interest rates to tackle inflation without driving the economy into recession. Meanwhile, Australia's new Labor government faces a series of challenges at its key economic summit Thursday. Here are six problems plaguing the nation right now.  | After a summer rally, US Investors went hungry in August, denied by Jerome Powell's Federal Reserve of opportunities to profit like no other month in 40 years. Every major asset slid. The least-atrocious return was a 1.9% loss on high-yield corporate bonds. Worse were a 2.2% drop in Treasuries, a 3.9% decline in commodities and a 4.2% slide in the S&P 500. And things are about to get a whole lot worse if some are to be believed. Famed investor Jeremy Grantham said the "super bubble" in stocks he previously warned about has yet to pop. Futures point to drops in Japan, Australia and Hong Kong and US equity futures are lower after US shares sealed their worst month since June. Treasuries slid. Taiwan warned it faces "severe military challenges" from surging Chinese military activity edging closer to the island, as Beijing tries to change the status quo in the Taiwan Strait. Taipei expects China to continue sending warships and jets across the median line that divides the waterway, the island's Ministry of National Defense said in an annual report. Meanwhile Taiwan said its military was stocking up on the same US-made weaponry that Ukraine had used to hold off Russia's military to deter China from following through on threats to take the island by force if necessary. China committed "serious human rights abuses" against ethnic Muslims in the Xinjiang region, the top United Nations rights official said in a report Beijing had tried to block. The report, delivered by Michelle Bachelet in the final hours of her tenure, found "interlocking patterns of severe and undue restrictions on a wide range of human rights" that affect the Uyghurs, an ethnic group who are largely Muslim, and others. The report cited "torture or other forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment" and the demolition of holy places. Get the full story here. Europe's policy makers talked some rather hawkish talk over the weekend and markets are expecting they will start walking the walk soon — and that they'll take some rather hefty strides when they do. Rates traders have priced in a three-quarter point hike and a half-point one by October for the European Central Bank, as pressure grows on officials to intensify their fight against record inflation in the region. Looking further ahead, swaps signal the ECB is expected to take its benchmark above the 2% mark within a year. While that's still under where the Fed is expected to be at that stage, the pace will be faster, and so the gap between US and European rates should become significantly narrower than its current very wide levels. That could also signal that the euro's plunge below parity is set to bottom out. With the euro the most-traded currency against the dollar, there's also a chance that the greenback's robust run is set to fizzle. Garfield Reynolds is Chief Rates Correspondent for Bloomberg News in Asia, based in Sydney. | 
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