Daytrading July 25 afternoon

Thanks Gttrain.

Half-time round-up:

The share market's winning run looks likely to end this afternoon after a second week of gains was tempered by falls across every sector except financials.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was 12 points or 0.2% weaker at 5576 as traders locked in profits at the end of a streak that saw the index rise on ten out of eleven sessions leading into today. A 0.2% rally in the financial sector this morning was swamped by falls in gold -1.9%, consumer staples -0.8%, property trusts -0.7%, the Small Ords -0.7% and metals & mining -0.5%.

The mood was brighter on Asian markets, where the MSCI Asia Pacific Index hit a new six-year high. China's Shanghai Composite put on 0.46%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.1% and Japan's Nikkei 0.57%. Dow futures were recently down 17 points or 0.1%.

“While valuations aren’t stretched, there will be limitations as to how far this rally can go,” Matthew Sherwood, head of investment markets research at Perpetual, told Bloomberg. “Whenever a downward draft comes into the market, it’s likely to prove short-lived on the back of continued monetary support, valuations and an improving growth environment.”

Crude oil futures eased four cents this morning to US$101.96 a barrel. Spot gold was $1.70 softer at US$1,292.30 an ounce. The dollar was buying 94.11 US cents.


About time we saw a pullback. Markets don't move in straight lines but this one has done a pretty good job of doing exactly that lately. I drew a good wage from SAR and TNG and made a little more by trading the bounces in MSB. Been a decent week.