Daytrading April 2 afternoon

Thanks again Beany for your distinguished service. Enjoy the lie-ins. Have a good Easter, all - see you on the other side of the chocolate frenzy.


Half-time round-up:

The share market looks set to end the trading week modestly lower after ignoring soft overnight leads and advancing on the last session before the four-day Easter break.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was 40 points or 0.7% higher at 5901 and within 20 points of where it started a trendless week. Weakness in the metals & mining sector (-0.3%) and consumer staples (-0.4%) was out-weighed by gains in the gold sector +4.2%,  consumer discretionary +1.3%, industrials +1.1%, property trusts +1.1% and financials +0.9%.

China's Shanghai Composite rallied 0.17%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.35% and Japan's Nikkei 1.5%. Dow futures were recently off 19 points or 0.1%.

Crude oil futures retraced 55 cents this morning to US$49.54 a barrel. Spot gold was $5.70 weaker at US$1,202.50 an ounce. The dollar was buying 75.99 US cents.


Interesting index action. Likely that the possibility of a rate cut on Tuesday is offsetting any fears about how Wall Street will trade in the two sessions before the ASX reopens. Trading: scraped a jittery profit out of the first bounce in TON. Should have got the second as well. Like Speckledjim, I had my eye on BAL for capitulation and got a nice bounce profit this morning. Been a good week.