Afternoon trading October 30

Thanks Oscar and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

Shares recovered from an early sell-off as regional markets shrugged off a volatile session on Wall Street.

The ASX 200 reached the halfway mark eight points or 0.15% stronger at 5737 after earlier falling as low as 5692. Leading the revival were consumer staples +0.6% and financials +0.5%. Resource stocks were the biggest drag on the index, the gold sector falling 2.1% and materials 0.2%.

The early weakness followed a night of violent swings in the US, where the S&P 500 traded above 2,700 and close to 2,600 before closing 17.5 points or 0.66% weaker at 2,641. S&P 500 futures were recently ahead 7.5 points or 0.28%.

The market mood was calmer in Asia, where China's Shanghai Composite edged up 0.19% andJapan's Nikkei 0.41%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng slid 0.47%

Crude oil futures extended their overnight weakness with a decline of 17 cents or 0.25% this morning to US$66.87 a barrel. Gold futures rallied $3 or 0.15%to US$1,231 an ounce. The dollar was buying 70.68 US cents.

Trading: managed to scramble onto a lifeboat at the open to escape my disastrous voyage on the Titanic, aka GCY. (Although when I say "lifeboat", I mean a floating door and I had to push Kate Winslet off cause she wouldn't share - you've seen the movie.) Spent the rest of the morning repairing the iceberg-sized hole in the trading account with bounce wins in RAP and FLC. A better day.