Morning Market Report

The market is up 3 points. ASX 200 Futures were up 8 this morning.

The Dow Jones finished up 3 — it was up 5 at best and down 151 at worst. Now 15559. The S&P 500 closed up 1.The Dow Jones hit its lows on the back of a 3% fall on the Japanese market and a comment from the IMF that economic risk remained on the downside.

The Michigan university consumer sentiment number came in slightly higher than expected. Amazon.com up 2.84% on results.Expedia down 27.38% on results. 

Resources up with BHP up 0.77% and RIO up 0.58% in the US with BHP closing at the equivalent of 4c up on Friday’s close in Australia. 

The A$ is at 92.79c. It hit 93.19c at its high last week but fell back on the weak Chinese PMI number and the lower than expected CPI number. It recently hit a low of 89.99c. 

European markets mixed — the UK FTSE down 0.50%, the German Dax down 0.65%, the French CAC up 0.32% with Spain up 0.86%, Italy down 0.06%, Greece up 2.63%.

Greece rallied on the expectations that they will receive the next 2.5 billion euro in bailout funds today. As one newswire puts it, they are living from cheque to cheque.

The Chinese market was down 0.51% on Friday with Japan down 2.97%.

Metals mostly down. Copper and nickel both down over 2%. The weekly uranium price is down another $1.75 to $36.50/lb. Oil price down 79c to 104.70. Gold price up $7.30 to $1321. The gold price is up 12.04% from its low of $1179 on 28th June. It recently peaked at $1348.70. Spot iron ore was up yet again by 50c to $132.60.

Best US sectors — healthcare (+0.6%), consumer services (+0.5%) and telecoms (+0.4%).

Worst US sectors — basic materials (-0.3%), energy (-0.3%) and industrials (-0.2%).

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND STORIES

  • Leighton Holdings (LEI) — Subsidary Thiess has bought Silcar, a telco infrastructure firm with contracts to roll out the national broadband network (NBN). Silcar had previously been a 50-50 joint venture between Thiess and German technology giant Siemens. But under a new deal Thiess has taken full ownership of Silcar.
  • Rio Tinto (RIO) — Is to sell its majority stake in a copper-and-gold mine in Australia for US$820 million to a Chinese resources company. It will sell a 80% stake in the Northparkes mine to China Molybdenum Co.
  • OZ Minerals (OZL) — Expects to take a hit of up to $240 million due to lower copper and gold prices and a landslip at one of its mines. OZ Minerals will release its half-yearly earnings results on August 14. Last  week it cut production guidance for 2013 to 120,000-130,000 ounces of gold from the previous 130,000-150,000 ounces, as a result of the landslip.
  • Transpacific Industries Group (TPI) — Will sell their commercial vehicles group to US automotive retailer Penske Automotive Group Inc for $219 million. The sale will generate a profit of $85 million. Sale proceeds will be used to repay debt.