The Overnight Report: All Quiet

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By Greg Peel

Breather

Apologies if I led anyone astray in suggesting the Australia’s private sector capex numbers were due out yesterday. It appears at some point the ABS decided to shift the release to next week, not the day after the construction numbers, which has always been the case. I was caught out earlier in the year as well when the ABS shifted the employment numbers to a week later than they had always been published each month.

It’s a pity, given on a day in which there is no Wall Street to write about, there’s not a lot to say about the local market either, which after two sessions of solid rally took a breather yesterday, a decision made easier by the Thanksgiving holiday in the US.

The ASX200 did spike up on the open, by the 16-odd points needed to ring the 5500 bell, but this resistance level may require a bit of work to break. It proved the trigger for profit-taking after the run-up from the 5150 Trump low.

There was not a lot going on amongst the sectors yesterday. Materials was the worst performer with a 0.6% drop, thanks to the plunge in the gold price. Gold miners dominated the top ten decliners board. Energy also eased back 0.5%. Consumer staples won the day with a 0.6% gain.

All other sector moves were minimal. The corporate story of the day was that of Boral ((BLD)). It dropped 19% or over a dollar to $4.99 after coming out of a trading halt. The halt was all about the company’s major US acquisition, and the price plunge was all about the capital raising required to fund it. That raising includes a rights issue and placement at $4.80, so $4.99 is actually not that bad, and Boral shareholders will gain back the drop on discounted rights.

The SPI Overnight is up 13 points this morning. Wall Street was closed and European markets did little, so perhaps we can only turn to some further metal price rises to inspire a push through 5500 today.

Commodities

Iron ore has become exceedingly volatile of late, rising another US$2.00 last night to US$79.60/t.

Base metal prices mostly continue to press higher. Aluminium slipped 0.5% last night but copper and lead rose 1% and zinc rose 2%.

Gold is down another US$3.20 to US$1183.90/oz.

The oils were again barely moved. West Texas crude is at US$47.96/bbl. The OPEC meeting is next Wednesday.

The US dollar index is up less than 0.1% at 101.73 and the Aussie is 0.3% higher at US$0.7406 with commodity prices continuing to provide the offset to greenback strength.

Today

As noted, the SPI Overnight closed up 13 points or 0.2%.

Wall Street will open for a half-day session tonight, closing at 1pm NY time. Only those drawing the short straws will be in attendance, with everyone else enjoying a four-day break.

There are a few more AGMs locally today.

Rudi will hook up with Sky Business later this morning to discuss broker calls, at around 11.05am, through Skype.
 

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