Afternoon trading September 18

Thanks Grundlebundle and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

Shares unwound most of yesterday's gains as an escalation in the US-China trade war weighed on US equity futures.

The ASX 200 dropped 19 points or 0.3% to 6166 by mid-session as domestic traders weighed the likely impact of a fresh round of US tariffs on Chinese imports. The White House this morning announced a 10% tariff on US$200 billion worth of Chinese goods, rising to 25% by year-end. Read more here.

In a statement, US President Donald Trump threatened further tariffs if China makes good on threats to respond with measures of its own: “If China takes retaliatory action against our farmers or other industries, we will immediately pursue phase three, which is tariffs on approximately US$267 billion of additional imports.”

Although the latest shot in the trade war had been widely anticipated, S&P 500 futures were recently down six points or 0.21%. The reaction on Asian markets was more muted. China's Shanghai Composite dipped into the red, but was lately up 0.16%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng shed 0.63%. Japan's Nikkei rallied 1.07%.

The decline on the local market was cushioned by gains in utilities +1% and financials +0.1%. Hardest hit were energy stocks -1.5%, IT -1.4%, gold -1.1% and materials -0.7%.

Crude oil futures dropped 30 cents or 0.44% this morning to US$68.61 a barrel. Gold futures eased $3.90 or 0.32% to US$1,202 an ounce. The dollar was buying 71.74 US cents.



Looks like whoever drove the CAG rally has now exited and ceased propping the share price. Buy side suddenly looks threadbare. Hope no one here has found themselves high and dry. Trading: a few morsels at OBJ's low, but not enough for a decent return.