Good morning and welcome to the second last day of the trading week. The local bourse is set to track higher today with futures indicating a rise of just less than a per cent around 8.30am Sydney time.
That follows another relatively strong night on Wall Street where the S&P 500 and NASDAQ both recovered from a sell-off triggered by US core inflation data coming in slightly hotter than expected.
US core inflation sits at 3.2% while headline inflation sits lower at 2.5%.
As above so below: shelter prices in the US remain one of the biggest inflation drivers there, too – just like Australia.
Brent, silver, copper, nickel and some base metals all rose gently overnight at the same time Putin was reported to be considering minerals export curbs from Russia.
On the ASX, BHP, Nine Entertainment and TPG are among stocks trading ex-dividend today.
In forex, the Aussie is buying 67 US cents.
Looking at commodities which are in the greenback,
Iron Ore is fetching just above US$90 per tonne,
Brent Crude is just over US$70 per barrel,
Gold is at US$2,513 an ounce, and,
US natgas at US$2.27 per gigajoule.
That’s Market Open, I’m Jon Davidson, we’ll be with you later for an update.