The market is up 41. The SFE Futures were up 7 this morning.

Wall Street closed down 1 on Friday. The Dow index was down at much as 120 at one stage on a disappointing GDP number. The Dow had a good month in July, up 7.1%. According to the IMF, the US financial system is “stable but vulnerable” and banks could require up to $76bn in capital. The oil price was up 69c to $79.05, Gold out on $12.60 to $1182.40 and the Aussie dollar improved to 90.58c from 90.07c.

In other news…

  • Stockland Group (SGP) has launched a $266m cash takeover offer for Aevum (AVE). The offer valuing AVE 150c a share has been labeled as opportunistic by the AVE board. The offer represents a 37.6% premium to AVE’s last closing price. AVE owns retirement villages. SGP has upped their stake in AVE to 15.9% from 5.8% and say the acquisition will be EPS neutral in FY11 and 3% accretive in FY12. SGP up 3c to 382c. AVE up 47c to 156c, up 43.1%.
  • Fortescue Metals (FMG) CEO Andrew Forrest told the press on the weekend that plans for a $17bn expansion of their iron ore projects in WA could be derailed by the new MRRT laws — “It will have a very, very severe impact on that decision”. FMG up 8c to 437c.
  • Premier Investments (PMV) expects their subsidiary, Just Group, to report EBITDA in the range of $100m-$110m for the year, up from an estimated $82m-$86m. They predict its performance to improve significantly as the 2nd half of the year has proved to be very challenging. PMV down 8c to 630c.
  • Crane Group (CRG) — FY Result — Net profit fell 27% to $31.9m from $43.6m after sales fell in all four business divisions. The underlying profit figure came in at $36.8m. Analysts expected $36.3m. CRG up 3.7% to 869c.
  • Argo Investments (ARG) — FY Result — Underlying net profit (excluding realised gains from the sale of listed shares) fell 13% to $142.8m. ARG up 8c to $6.
  • Downer EDI (DOW) has appointed Grant Fenn as their new CEO. He previously held the role of finance director. Patersons maintain their HOLD recommendation. DOW down 13c to 484c.
  • ASX Ltd (ASX) formally transferred their supervision of trading power to ASIC yesterday. ASX up 16c to 2906c.
  • Australia’s manufacturing sector increased for the 7th straight month in July — the index increased 1.5 points in July from June to 54.4. A reading above 50 indicates expansion.
  • RBA Meeting tomorrow — Expected to leave rates unchanged after a benign inflation number last week.

Stock hitting fresh yearly highs today include: Magellan Financial Grp, Reckon, Thorn Group.

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