The market is up 59. The SFE Futures were up 59 this morning.

Wall Street closed up 204 overnight. It closed on its high and was down 3 at worst. Metals had a strong session in London and both the oil and gold price impressed. Oil put on $1.78 to $79.21 and Gold hit an all time intra day high to close at $1101.40. The Aussie dollar continued its rise to 93c compared to 92.20c yesterday morning.

Making the news today…

  • The broker research this morning says although a rival bid is unlikely, there is a good chance AMP Ltd (AMP) will lift its bid for AXA Asia Pacific (AXA). AMP up 4.08% to 637c and AXA up another 2.81% to add to the 30% it put on yesterday.
  • BC Iron (BCI) and JV partner Fortescue Metals Group (FMG) has secured $US50m in an off-take agreement for their Nullagine JV. The agreement, with a Hong Kong-based company, is for 20m tonnes of iron ore to be supplied during the next 8.5 years. BCI down 2.8% to 120.5c and FMG up 3.59% to 405c.
  • David Jones (DJS) will open stage 1 of the Bourke Street Store on November 28. DJS up 2.1% to 580c.
  • Insurance Group Australia (IAG) AGM — says its 2009 results were encouraging and reaffirmed FY guidance. It has also appointed current director Brian Schwartz to take over as chairman at the end of fiscal 2010. IAG up 2c to 389c.
  • Fairfax Media (FXJ) down 2.5c to 162c after CEO Brian McCarthy announced at the AGM that underling EBITDA for the first four months of FY10 is down 15% on last year. He also sees improved moods among advertisers.
  • PMP Ltd (PMP) AGM — expects 1H EBIT of between $28m-$30m. PMP down 0.5c to 71c.
  • Do shareholders have a say? Ryan Stokes, son of Kerry Stokes, has maintained his seat on SEV board against most shareholders wishes. Almost 38m votes were cast against him remaining on the board, but just over 100m votes supported his re-election. 92.8m of those were cast by companies owned by Kerry Stokes. SEV up 2% to 653c.
  • There are upgrades around in CBA and Orica after FY and Q1 results yesterday. CBA up another 72c to 5580c and ORI up 30c to 2391c.
  • Australian business confidence increased by two index points to plus 16 in October. Good result considering if fell in September.
  • Economist Nouriel Roubini is concerned central banks are fuelling a massive new asset bubble.
  • Stocks hitting fresh yearly highs today include: AXA Asia Pacific (AXA), Bell Financial Group (BFG), Sino Gold (SGX) and West Australian News (WAN).

The Dow Futures down 4 at midday.

MARCUS PADLEY is the author of the MARCUS TODAY Daily Stockmarket Newsletter.

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