daytrading august 9 afternoon

Thanks Endless. I'm awake but can't say my mindless web surfing has suffered many interruptions from the market this morning.

Half-time round-up:

The share market is on track for its first significant weekly loss in seven weeks after a downgraded growth outlook from the Reserve Bank compounded a soft morning for yield stocks.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was 21 points or 0.4% weaker at 5043 as gains in resource stocks were outweighed by losses elsewhere. A close around that level would leave the index about 70 points lower for the week, its worst performance since June.

A two-speed market this morning saw China-facing sectors such as metals & mining +2.2%, materials +1.8% and gold +3.2% benefit from yesterday's upbeat trade figures, while yield sectors such as health -1.1%, financials -0.7% and consumer staples -0.6% saw profit taking as a jump in the dollar magnified profits for overseas investors. The Aussie was this morning buying 91.19 US cents, its highest level in a week and a half.

The market overcame a temporary blip after the Reserve Bank cut its GDP expectations for the year to 2.25% from a forecast of 2.5% three months ago. The bank highlighted the transition from a mining-driven economy as a risk to growth as the mining boom cools down.

"The forecast for Australian GDP continues to embody a transition in the drivers of growth from mining investment to other parts of domestic demand, and to exports," the RBA said. "There remains considerable uncertainty about how this transition will proceed."

The first batch of today's Chinese economic data delivered no surprises. Retail inflation was steady last month and wholesale prices deflated in line with expectations. Read more here. More data is due at 3.30pm.

Asian markets responded positively to overnight gains on Wall Street. Shanghai put on 0.35%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.43% and Japan's Nikkei 0.6%. Dow futures were recently ahead eight points or 0.1%.

Crude oil futures bounced 28 cents this morning to US$104.13 a barrel. Spot gold firmed $2.50 to US$1,314.30 an ounce.


Not a good day to buy the open. A few shares began with a bang and then petered out. Hope no one here got caught. Like TH, I bided my time with FAS and hope to see a reward this afternoon or perhaps next week. Suffered the curse of part-fills in MRM and BTR, both of which would have delivered decent profits with a full order. Caught AVH near the low.