The market is unchanged (yawn). The market was up 15 at best. The SFE Futures were up 24 this morning.

Wall St. closed down 9 overnight. The Dow was up 64 at best and down 29 at worst. Metals had another solid session in London, Nickel the big mover – up 2.74%. A better than expected ISM Services index impressed the market. Greece made more promises, enough to lift the Euro to a two week high. Gold put on $6 to $1143, Oil increased $1.49 to $80.93. The Aussie dollar improved to 90.52c from 90.39c yesterday morning.

Quiet day on the news front…

  • Gloucester Coal (GCL) says their independent directors recommend shareholders accept the MacArthur Coal (MCC) takeover offer in “the absence of a superior proposal”. MCC is offering 0.84 MCC shares for every one GCL shares (script alternative) or $8 cash for every one GCL share (cash alternative). GCL up 8c to 941c, MCC down 2c to 1128c.
  • Nufarm (NUF) is being questioned by the ASX why they reported a loss for the 1H just minutes before shareholders voted to sell a 20% stake to Japan’s Sumitomo Chemicals at $14 a share. NUF has underperformed by around 55% in the past year. NUF down 7c to 921c.
  • Nickel stocks have continued their impressive form, up again today. Panoramic Resources (PAN) has put on another 4.4% to 239c, adding to yesterdays 8% gain. Mirabela Nickel (MBN) put on 4.6% yesterday and is up another 3.1% today to 236c.
  • Platinum Australia (PLA) announced striking workers at their Smokey Hills mine in South Africa that had disrupted production have been sacked by their contractors. PLA down 3.8% to 91.5c.
  • Coote (CXG) up 23% to 24c after being bid for by private company Elph. They are offering 26c for the 35% shares they current don’t own.
  • Citigold Corp (CTO) has signed an agreement with China’s Henan Jingu Gold to develop a $70m gold mining operation in QLD. CTO up 9.8% to 10c.
  • Kingsgate Consolidated (KCN) up 15c to 915c is aiming to offer shares on the Thai Stock Exchange later this year and used the funds to expand in the Asian region.
    Companies hitting fresh yearly highs today include Hills Industries (HIL), Australian Infrastructure Fund (AIX) and OceanaGold Corp (OGC).
  • Noticeable companies going ex-dividend today include AGL Energy (AGK) — 29c, Lend Lease (LLC) — 20c, Perpetual (PPT) — 105c. Tomorrow we have … Toll
  • Holdings (TOL) — 11.5c, Primary Health Care (PRY) — 15c, and Flight Centre (FLT) — 26c.

The Dow Futures were down 4 at midday.

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