Thanks Beany and morning regulars. Half-time round-up: Shares...

Thanks Beany and morning regulars.


Half-time round-up:

Shares retreated for a second day as a downbeat night on world markets and tepid GDP data capped risk appetite.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was trading 33 points or 0.55% in the red at 5901 after a brief early rally gave way to renewed selling as the market continued to factor in the Reserve Bank's decision to leave the cash rate on hold yesterday afternoon. A mixed morning saw gains in IT 0.9%, health 0.6%, energy 0.6% and industrials 0.2% dwarfed by losses in metals & mining -1.3% as Rio Tinto went ex-dividend, and financials, telecoms and gold, all down 0.8%.

“The lack of fresh sparks has prompted investors to take profits and wait for new signals,” Matthew Sherwood, head of investment markets research at Perpetual, told Bloomberg. The market “is starting to show signs of fatigue and is now lacking momentum as earnings downgrades begin to overpower the impact of increased monetary stimulus and an improving US economy.”

Economic growth figures for last quarter came in broadly in line with expectations, confirming that the economy continues to perform below long-term trends. Gross domestic product increased by 0.5% in the last three months of 2014, just below the consensus of 0.6%. Year-on-year GDP eased to 2.5% from 2.7% per cent in the previous quarter.

Most Asian markets extended yesterday's falls as US futures remained mired in red. China's Shanghai Composite edged up 0.12%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng lost 0.27% and Japan's Nikkei declined 0.9%. Dow futures were recently off 27 points or more than 0.1%.

Crude oil futures rallied ten cents this morning to US$50.62 a barrel. Spot gold was $1.70 ahead at US$1,206.10 an ounce. The dollar was buying 78.3 US cents.


Nothing new under the sun. NRT has cured cancer again. MJP has moved further in a morning than the XJO does in a year. The only thing missing was a Jermaine Jackson update from GCN, which regrettably won't happen because they're suspended for not lodging their accounts on time. Pity. I was hoping they'd counter AB1's deal with Paris Hilton by signing another Jackson. Marlon hasn't had a lot on since his solo album tanked in 1987. Trading: a scrappy session after two days of plenty. Wasted a lot of time watching MJP without getting any clear read on what's going on. Potentially nice trade in MYR was undone by a part-fill. Got something out of PAN and SBB but it's thin fare compared to yesterday.