Afternoon trading Oct 17

Thanks Oscar and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

Shares set a five-month high as a multi-year peak for mining giant Rio Tinto helped the market's bull run extend into a fifth straight session.

The ASX 200 surged 31 points or 0.5% this morning to 5878, along the way touching its highest point since mid-May. The benchmark index has rallied on seven out of the last eight sessions, bringing a resounding end to five months of trendless, sideways action.

RIO provided much of the momentum, rising 1.1% to its strongest price since February 2013 after beating expectations for quarterly iron ore exports. The news helped the materials sector rise 0.9%. Also strong: gold stocks +0.7%, metals & mining +0.7% and financials +0.7%.

A mixed morning in Asia saw China's Shanghai Composite dip 0.33%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng barely changed at -0.01% and Japan's Nikkei also flat at +0.03%. Dow futures were recently off a point or less than 0.01%.

Crude oil futures declined 10 cents or 0.2% this morning to US$51.77 a barrel. Gold futures eased $7.40 or 0.57% to US$1,295.60 an ounce. The dollar was buying 78.4 US cents.


Funny old game, the share market. Does nothing for five months, then takes off like a scalded cat. 'Cat' might be a good metaphor - capricious, unpredictable, unreliable. You feed it and can go months without getting much affection in return. When you think you're getting along well, it turns around and claws chunks out of you. Other times it's your best friend - but only when it wants to be and even then only on its own terms. Trading: caught the partial bounce in KDR but only got a part-fill. Missed MUS but got EHX.