Midday Report- Big Highs and Lows in Morning Trade
22-Nov: The market has experienced a record breaking morning, banking and resources stocks pushing the ASX 200 into unchartered territory for the first time since September, before plummeting back into negative territory in later trade.
A positive result on Wall Street overnight and the rising price of gold helped to boost the market in early trade, before profit taking saw the gains largely erased.
Energy stocks were still up as a result of an increase in oil prices.
At midday the ASX 200 was 11.4 points lower at 4643, while the All Ordinaries were also down, shedding 10.7 points to finish morning trade at 4586.
Lion Nathan's Acquisition of Coopers is looking even more unlikely, with analysts predicting the brewer's increased offer still won't be enough to persuade Coopers shareholders.
The company's offer currently stands at $420 million, up $70 million from their previous figure of $350 million.
Rebel Sport has announced a 8.4 per cent jump in retail sales during the past four months, recording a revenue of $103 million for the period.
The retailer, 56 per cent of which is owned by Harvey Norman, also posted pleasing sales results for their nine Glue streetwear stores.
Life Therapeutics has started an early-stage project to develop a specialty immune globulin to combat influenza.
This is a multi-year program to immunize selected donors with the flu vaccine and collect their hyperimmune blood plasma, which is then created for use in a therapeutic drug to combat infection caused by the virus.
The biggest gains during on the ASX 100 in early trade have been recorded by Symbion Health Limited, their shares rising 5.38 per cent or 17 cents to $3.33.
Oxiana Limited has recorded the largest fall in price in the Top 20 stocks, dropping 3.16 per cent or 4.5 cents to $1.38.
At 1200 AEST the 12 GICS indices were :- Discretion 2248 down 4 Energy 10,249 up 92.6 Financials 5518 down 22 Fin-x-property 5695 down 26 Health Care 6280 down 17 Industrials 5289 down 26 Info Technology 448 up 2 Materials 8677 down 10 Property Trusts 1880 down 2 Consumer Staples 6027 up 21 Telecoms 1493 up 1 Utilities 5421 up 38
Individual stock performances BHP Billiton up 12 cents to $ 21.83. Rio Tinto down 26 cents to $ 62.34.
Banks Westpac down 2 cents to $ 22.18. NAB down 10 cents to $ 32.66. ANZ down 13 cents to $23.79. Commonwealth Bank down 13 cents to $ 41.51.
Media News Corp up 23 cents to $ 21.18. PBL down 16 cents to $16.44. The Seven Network down 1 cent to $8.10. John Fairfax down 9 cents to $3.95.
Retail Woolworths down 22 cents to $17.25. Coles Myer steady on $10.01. Harvey Norman down 2 cents to $2.80. David Jones steady on $2.46.
Transport Toll Holdings down 5 cents to $13.67. Patrick Corporation down 6 cents to $7.21. Qantas down 4 cents to $3.73.
