Daytrading May 12 afternoon

Thanks Brit and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

The Australian share market's five-session win streak was under pressure this morning as a global retrace swept through Asia and traders took profits after the benchmark index failed to hold 5400 yesterday.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was 22 points or 0.4% weaker at 5350 but above the morning low of 5338. The index hit a nine-month high at 5425 yesterday before paring five days of gains. Overnight the S&P 500 slid 0.96% following earnings updates from Disney and Macy's.

“There’s just enough out there to keep investors cautious,” Tim Schroeders, portfolio manager at Pengana Capital, told Bloomberg. “We’ve got earnings disappointments and currency volatility so people are sitting back and waiting as opposed to continuing with the frenzy.”

Leading the retreat were utilities -1.5%, financials -1.2% and industrials -0.8%, offsetting solid gains in gold +3.9%, energy +1.9% and metals and mining +1.4%.

Asian markets followed Wall Street lower. China's Shanghai Composite declined 0.76%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.43% and Japan's Nikkei 0.41%. Dow futures were recently ahead 10 points or 0.06%.

Crude oil futures pared overnight gains, falling 20 cents or 0.6% this morning to US$46.03 a barrel. Gold futures were 60 cents or 0.05% softer at US$1,274.90 an ounce. The dollar was buying 73.42 US cents.


Nice rebound considering the overnight leads. We're quick to complain when the ASX underperforms its peers, so it's worth noting its (RBA-fuelled) relative strength right now. Echoes of last year's late Jan/early Feb RBA-fuelled run. We won't discuss how that turned out. Trading: if you wanted to make a movie about the perils of trading from home, you could do worse than start with a kid with chicken pox, then throw in the Jehovahs Witnesses on the doorstep at 10.05 am. The Wolf of Wall Street didn't have these problems. It's a miracle I made a brass razzoo with the interruptions (sample: "Dad! Come and look at how I'm lying down!" Me: "That's great, son. Way to lie down.") Squeezed trades out of SCI and XTV somehow.