Thanks Endless. I needed that mid-morning wake-up call - been quiet as the grave here, lol.
Half-time round-up:
Australian shares jumped more than 3% today as bargain-hunting and short-covering trumped panic selling for the first morning in a week.
At lunchtime the ASX 200 was ahead 126 points or 3.1% at 4160, led by substantial gains for materials +4% and financials +3.5%. Property trusts was the only sector to move lower as market heavyweight Westfield traded without its dividend.
"Volatility is calming down from an extreme level," Greg Gibbs, strategist at RBS, told Fairfax. "Clearly there's going to be considerable concerns still, but the market had got seriously carried away and gone to an extreme of fear."
Most Asian markets were more cautious in their gains. Japan's Nikkei put on 1.15%, Shanghai 1.97% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 3.76%. Dow futures were recently neutral at -1.
The dollar trimmed overnight gains as consumer confidence dipped to two-year lows. The Aussie was recently down half a cent at US$1.0352 after the WBC-MI consumer confidence gauge fell 3.5% in the latest reading to a level last seen in May 2009. The decline was the index's fourth in a row.
"Coming after a fall of 8.3 per cent in July, this latest fall is sending a significant message," Westpac Chief Economist, Bill Evans, told Fairfax. "This financial turmoil has added another dimension of risk to consumers over and above those issues associated with interest rates, house prices, carbon tax, and potentially, jobs."
Crude oil futures eased 48 cents this morning to US$81.57 a barrel. Spot gold was $10.30 stronger at US$1,754.80 an ounce.
Cautious approval from Asian markets for last night's Wall Street rebound but no irrational exuberance. Perhaps like me they're thinking Ben Bernanke bought his rally pretty cheaply. As Nazzysmith observed this morning, interest rates were going nowhere anyway and the rest of the statement was long on flannel and short on commitments. Never mind, a rally is a rally and I used the morning to lighten a few holdings. QBE was my only day trade.
