Daytrading January 3 afternoon

Thanks Oscar and morning crew. Good to be back. Hope the season treated everyone well.


Half-time round-up:

Shares hit a fresh 19-month high this morning as US equity futures and crude oil rallied ahead of the first US trading session of 2017.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was 65 points or 1.15% ahead at 5731 and on track for its first close above 5700 since August 2015 and its strongest finish since June of that year. All sectors advanced except gold (-0.9%), led by the energy sector, up 1.4% as West Texas Intermediate crude put on 29 cents or 0.54% to US$54.01 a barrel this morning. Also strong were metals & mining +1.4%, industrials +1.3% and utilities +1.3%.

Dow futures strengthened 55 points or 0.28% after mainland European stocks rallied overnight on news of a pick-up in manufacturing.  China's Shanghai Composite gained 0.75% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.42%. Japan's Nikkei was closed.

Gold futures added $4.70 or 0.41% at US$1,156.40 an ounce. The dollar was buying 72.07 US cents.


Bulls are taking advantage of weak volumes to push decisively through 5700. Get clear and there looks to be acres of upside before the next significant resistance level towards 6000. We've pretty much ignored the minor correction on Wall Street leading into New Year. All seems a bit too good to be true, but I'm not complaining. Trading: started the day lean and hungry - okay, make that holiday-flabby and slightly peckish - but struggled to find trades. BGS was a good opp but it got away while I dithered. Looked at HHL but can't make any sense of recent events. Still shaking off the seasonal lethargy.