Australian Stocks: What Happened Today?

Array
(
    [0] => Array
        (
        )

    [1] => Array
        (
        )

)

Aussie 200 index breaks key short term support levels and the Aussie Dollar attempts to hold above 89 cents but is unable to, with further selling pressure driving the currency down, off the back of continued weakness in Copper and Iron Ore.

What are traders talking about today?

•    S&P/ASX200 lost 83.2 points or -1.56% on volume of $3.7 billion, closing at 5329.4.
•    Gold is having some minor distributive selling at these loftier levels with a minor sell down from intraday highs at 1,376.5 per ounce. Momentum is well and truly to the upside but that won’t stop many traders for trying to pick up a few ticks to the down side.
•    Copper continues its downward spiral hitting fresh new lows again and the ramifications are definitely being felt across the broad ASX index.
•    Tensions in Ukraine have tightened with reports of a US F-16 fighter jet landing at central Poland’s Lask air base for military exercises.
•    The Aussie Dollar has been struggling over the last handful of trading sessions, falling from highs around 0.9100 and as I write this, hitting 0.8998 or just below the 90 cent handle.
•    The Nikkei index broke through short term support and has been rapidly heading lower, breaking below 14,300 on an intraday basis.
•    Jon Corzine’s son, Jeffrey Corzine, has been reported dead with more details to come.

Economic news

•    The ANZ Roy Morgan weekly consumer confidence index numbers were out today, providing some light after 3 weeks of falling values. The index was up by 3.8 points to 113.4.
•    Traders will be watching the US PPI figures being released Friday night with a forecast coming in at 0.2 per cent.

Australian sector watch

Looking over the charts

•    Unfortunately our market was unable to hold on to the most recent support levels and today’s solid red candle is testimony to the power behind the sellers.
•    Despite the selling pressure from the look of today’s negative candle, we still have a number of stocks in a solid uptrend that were right on the edge of breaking into new high territory.
•    Technically this correction isn’t really favouring the bulls as a few technical levels were broken plus it came off a double top pattern formation. This could take us down to the 5265 level.
•    At this point we would look for a broad range between 5300-5330 to hold and if it cannot we’ll likely sell more selling pressure and perhaps some stop loss existing step in.

ASX top 200 stock analysis

31% of stocks are showing oversold levels, 7% are showing overbought levels and 49% of stocks are currently above their long term moving average as of close of trading today. View the image below to better understand overbought and oversold levels.

S&P/ASX 200 Gainers and Losers

Top 5 gainers:
•    AQG    ALACER GOLD CORP    3.83%
•    WHC    WHITEHAVEN COAL    3.29%
•    RFG    RETAIL FOOD GROUP    1.82%
•    MRM    MERMAID MARINE AUSTRALIA    1.79%
•    HZN    HORIZON OIL    1.56%
Top 5 Losers:
•    ABC    ADELAIDE BRIGHTON    -13.59%
•    AGO    ATLAS IRON    -6.67%
•    IGO    INDEPENDENCE GROUP NL    -6.54%
•    MML    MEDUSA MINING    -6.51%
•    TEN    TEN NETWORK HOLDINGS    -6.06%