Thanks Brit and morning crew. Half-time round-up: The share...

Thanks Brit and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

The share market looks set to end its first winning week since mid-October with a fourth straight rise as the healing among the big banks and miners continued this morning.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was trading 23 points or 0.4% ahead at 5265 with gains in gold +2%, financials +0.9% and metals & mining +0.7% offsetting weakness in energy -0.91%, health -0.5% and utilities -0.4%.

A week that began with a six-week low has turned into one of the best in recent months as US investors became more comfortable with the likelihood that interest rates will rise next month. At this morning's peak, the index had lifted more than 5.3% in four sessions.

“The Fed has made it clear that its base case is for a lift-off in December and if they were to break that, it would be a huge, market-moving event,” Evan Lucas, strategist at IG, told Bloomberg. “It’s been very positive for markets this week, with equities responding favorably to this macro picture.”

Asian markets were mixed. While China's Shanghai Composite edged up 0.15%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng shed 0.24% and Japan's Nikkei 0.45%. Dow futures were recently off two points or less than 0.1%.

Spot gold firmed $4.70 this morning to US$1,082.60 an ounce. Crude oil futures cents edged up a cent to US$40.55 a barrel. The dollar was buying 71.88 US cents.


A ripper of a week for the index. Got about another 100 points before it hits horizontal resistance. It will bump up against the downtrend line from April before then. Trading: very nice morning to end the week. CGF hit an all-time high yesterday, so today's pullback was an obvious buy. FBR also got a bit overdone and provided profits. Pygmy scalps in part-fills in ABU and ISX. Took the hit on PGH from yesterday.