The market is up 11. SFE Futures were down 1 this morning. Dow Jones was down 99. The Dow was up 7 at best and down 99 at worst on the back of mixed economic data and further discussion regarding the “fiscal cliff”. Lawmakers held another round of press conferences that saw the Republicans and Democrats fail to come to a deal. President Barack Obama says he and the top Republican in Congress are “pretty close”. Obama told reporters that the US deserves a compromise by the nation’s political leaders. “I’d like to get it done before Christmas,” he said. “There’s been a lot of posturing up on Capitol Hill instead of going ahead and getting stuff done, and we’ve been wasting a lot of time.” The president’s comments came shortly after the White House threatened to reject House Speaker John Boehner’s surprise backup plan for avoiding the “fiscal cliff,” saying it was time to stop political posturing and pursue recent progress in talks. US bond yields and Gold down, spot iron made another 5 month high.

US Homebuilding Permits were up by 3.6% in November to a seasonally adjusted of 899,000 — the highest level in nearly four and a half years. But housing starts were down 3% for the first time in four months.

Best sectors — info tech, financials. Worst sectors — telecoms, utilities, health care.

European markets up — UK FTSE up 0.43%, German DAX up 0.19%, France up 0.44%, Spain up 1.17%, Italy up 1.10%. Greece up 4.8%. Financial stocks led the gains with the STOXX 600 banking index up 0.5% and the insurance index up 1.1%.

  • CBA‘s business sales indicator rose 2.2% in November following a 1% fall in October. The survey suggests a rise in consumer spending ahead of Christmas.
  • The ACCC has blocked the acquisition of Trading Post from Telstra (TLS) by Carsales.com (CRZ) amid concerns that the acquisition will lessen competition in the automotive classifieds market. They concluded that the proposed acquisition was likely to result in a substantial lessening of competition. CRZ is down 1.32% to 748c.
  • Qantas Airways (QAN) and Emirates are set to receive approval from ACCC for their proposed alliance. In a draft decision handed down today the ACCC said it would authorise an alliance between the two airlines for a period of five years. QAN is up 0.34% to 145.5c.
  • OZ Minerals (OZL) — production downgrade — Expects their copper output in 2013 to be down in 2013 and earnings to be weighed down by lower commodity prices, reduced gold sales and increased production costs. Copper production is now expected to be between 90,000-100,000 tonnes next year down from previous guidance of 100,000-110,000 tonnes. Shares fell 9.8% yesterday on the back of these concerns. OZL is up 2.68% to 689c.
  • Anaemic growth next year — ANZ Chairman John Morschel warned that the Australian economy faces anaemic growth for the foreseeable future as the mining boom draws to an end and global uncertainty continues. ANZ is up 0.57% to 2477c.

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