The COB from ausbiz

It’s always disappointing when the market trades like a Friday and yet there is still one more day to go. The lacklustre lead overnight sparked less-than-stellar early trading, while some mid-afternoon buying enthusiasm was wiped out by the close. After consecutive blockbuster days, it was inevitable that the tech sector took a breather, closing down 1%. It was at the bottom of the leaderboar...

Better news on the Omicron front boosted risk appetite, and the local market ran with it in spades. Tech had another blockbuster day, closing up 2.2% at the top of the leaderboard. Zip Co closed 11% higher. Materials surged, led by the usual iron ore trio of BHP, Rio and Fortescue, the sector closing up 2%. Financials were initially left behind, but even they caught up with the sector closing...

As Omicron fears faded overnight - and combined with a dash of China policy stimulus - it was a green light to buyback yesterday’s battered tech/BNPL sector, as well as buy back into the usual re-opening stock suspects. Fading virus fears also boosted oil, pushing the energy complex over 2% by the close, led by a 3% pop in Oil Search which is destined to become part of Santos after proxies voted i...

It was a wild weekend for market moves - and Bitcoin - but it was a relatively low conviction day outside of tech where it was an eventful session. Tech shares and BNPL were smashed. The tech sector shed nearly 1%, led by Zip Co which closed nearly 10% lower and Sezzle dropped 13%. The energy sector added another 0.5% as oil futures edged higher while Aussie goldies benefited from the risk-off ton...

In a mirror image of recent days, the market opened at the highs then erased all gains by early afternoon. Then in a familiar pattern this week, the afternoon session unearthed the buyers. The energy sector added over 2% after crickets from OPEC+ sparked a higher oil price. Materials added nearly 1% thanks to BHP and Rio defying a dip in iron ore futures. Blue-chip banks also made the grade, finan...

In a repeat of yesterday, soggy morning trade gave way to a brighter afternoon after the market reached the low point at midday. The tech sector closed down 1% in the wake of a poor Nasdaq lead, sending Afterpay, Xero and Zip behind the woodshed for the day. Industrials had a solid session, up 0.8%. Blue-chip banks also made the grade, Commonwealth Bank up 2.2%. Worley closed o...

A soggy start saw the market reach the low at midday, however, plenty of guests expect volatility to bring opportunities to add to high conviction companies, and the broader market was listening. The standout sector was materials, closing over 1% higher. Financials were down 1% at midday. Pro Medicus closed down nearly 8% on no discernible news, leading the ASX200 losses, although it comes after a...

Outright panic morphed into a cautiously positive tone, then in the dying seconds of trading, a Financial Times report questioning the efficacy of vaccines against Omicron saw Asian stocks plummet. Top performer Collins Foods still surged by nearly 13% to a record high, thanks to finger-licking dividends and investors hungry for growth. Software company Nuix was thumped after more warnings of reve...

It was a nasty open, with Omicron nerves thumping stocks across the board. Then the markets digested early analysis that the virus may be highly transmissible but not necessarily deadly. Peak pessimism was 30 minutes into the session. Travel stocks initially bore the brunt, Qantas was down another 6.2% at the worst. Markets shrugged off GDP inputs; more are released tomorrow. At one stage the ASX2...

With no lead from the feasting Americans it was always going to be another lacklustre session, but risk-off near-panic won out on the day. Initially, the headline act was the shellacking of Appen after a broker downgrade, closing over 18% lower. The vortex also sucking in Kogan, down another 5.3%.  Then the stories started to pour in about a new covid19 variant - B.1.1.529 - initially sp...

As US market participants dream about turkey-laden dining tables instead of sitting at trading desks, today’s lacklustre session is highly likely to be repeated tomorrow. Only standout company news delivered a share price response greater than meh. EML Payments closing up over 31 per cent thanks to the green light for the Irish arm to conduct business, while Fisher and Paykel managed a 4.5 per cen...

The market improved through this Wednesday session, as the miners, energy names and the big banks lifted their games. But it just wasn't enough; after being up as much as 0.2%, ASX200 finished down 0.15% at 7399. Technology One was the biggest loser down 8.6% after downgrades from UBS and Macquarie after yesterday's result. Pinnacle suffered as it came back online following a capital raise, ending...

Seasoned market-watchers have no trouble reconciling why a Fed Chair (re)nomination would trigger a collapse in tech stocks. The less-dovish Powell nomination pushed bond yields higher, and so growth stocks wilted under the pressure. Shares in Afterpay were down over 7% at one stage, but closed down 5.6%. WiseTech Global fell 6%,while EML Payments and NextDC both closed around 5% lower. A sharp ju...

Resurgent COVID 'winter wave' fears thumped travel stocks, with Qantas and Flight Centre slumping to two-month lows. Aussie energy producers - Santos, Woodside, Oil Search and Beach Energy - had a rough start to the week as well. The energy complex closing down -1.6%. Elsewhere, banks are still struggling as investors re-assess the outlook in the wake of less than stellar updates from Westpac and...

The Australian share market finished 0.7% down on the week, despite some shoots of green on the day, with the ASX 200 finishing up 0.17%. Today was all about Crown Resorts as the casino giant received a fresh takeover offer from US private equity group Blackstone, sending the company's share price soaring more than 16%.In response, rival casino operator Star Entertainment fell more than 1.5%. All...

It was a bit of a bumpy ride for the local bourse today, finally ending up 0.1%. The REITS and consumer staple sectors lent strength, with energy and financials the laggards. The Commonwealth Bank share price lost another 1.3% with some investors warning against investing in the big banks . Mesoblast was the worst performer down 3.6%, but that didn't stop its CEO from joining us. Evolution wa...

Commonwealth Bank took a massive chunk out of the market this Wednesday, wiping off close to 52 index points, as it finished down xxx% below the $100 mark at $xxxx. It seems "considerably lower" net interest margins sent a sizeable number of investors elsewhere. The mortgage business is tough. The local bourse slid through much of the day finishing down XX at XX with the materials sector also...

Things went from bad to worse today, with the local market finishing the Tuesday session -0.67% at 7420. Let's start with the sin bin, Mesoblast gave up much of yesterday's gains closing down +8.2% by the end of the session. But it was the materials sector that proved the biggest weight overall, down 1.7% with Iluka the biggest loser after presenting at a mineral sands conference. Here's Shaw...

The local market put in a solid performance to start the week, ending the session +0.36%. The gains were broad based, but special mention goes to Mesoblast which rocketed higher as it was one of the headline acts at the American Heart Association conference; shares ended the day +11.8%. Special mention goes to Incitec Pivot which at one stage jumped 17.6% after its full year result beat expectatio...

The market finished the day up 0.83%, snapping a four day losing streak and nearly erasing the week to date losses in the process. First prize by sector goes to the materials space with gold stocks like GOR and PRU doing very nicely. IGO in the nickel space also contributed to the gains. In contrast, traders took their profits in NEA and ANN (the latter also because of a downgrade from Jeffer...

The local market extended its losing streak ending the day down 0.57%; not great but it would have been much worse without the miners. Fortescue ended the day 8% higher, it seems green (hydrogen) is its colour. That being said, the commodities complex in general improved on improved sentiment around China's property market. In fact, the top five performers by market cap and percentage points were...

The S&P/ASX200 closed lower on Wednesday, dropping 15 points or 0.2% to 7,419, the local index sliding to a five-day low after lunch, tracing iron ore futures and the broader commodities sector. Bluescope Steel (BSL) fell back 6.2% and Orocobre (ORE) stepped back 4.6%. Back in the good books, the National Australia Bank (NAB) up 4.2% after some of our favourite brokers tweaked NAB's targe...

The S&P/ASX200 closed lower Tuesday, dropping 18 points or 0.2% to 7,434. Investors rotated out of the banking sector and piled into some of those new metal plays. The National Australia Bank (NAB) and Newcrest Mining (NCM) fell despite putting out some decent news. Worst of the worst was an ex-dividend CSR Ltd (CSR), down 4.6%. Chalice Mining (CHN) closed some 27% higher, taking the diversifi...

The S&P/ASX200 closed down just five points Monday to 7,452, the index slipping on another M&A Monday as US futures weakened following a week of strong gains on Wall Street. Tech stocks weighed, as did the healthcare names, driven lower by Polynovo (PNV) and Clinuvel Pharmaceuticals (CUV), down 9.4% and 9.3% respectively. On the other side of the coin were the diggers and the travel stocks...

The S&P/ASX200 closed up Friday, gaining 29 points or 0.4% to 7,457 and setting a new 20-day high. of course that's peanuts to Wall Street, which once again traced a string of record highs amid scattered bond yields following the Bank of England market ambush of keeping a lid on rates Link and news Corp took the trophies home p 8.55% and 6.94% respectively. Over the last five days, the index h...