Australian shares dipped in and out of positive territory this morning after a brief rally on the back of upbeat Japanese industrial news.
Industrial production in Japan rose 5.9 per cent in May, the third monthly rise in a row, according to Fairfax's BusinessDay. The news helped the Nikkei gain 0.39% this morning but the Hang Seng slipped into the red, recently down 0.22%.
At lunchtime, the ASX 200 was down 3 points or 0.08% at 3900, with gains in the IT sector (1.8%), telecoms (0.8%) and metals & mining (0.6%).
Gold fell away this morning, dropping more than $3.50 from $939 to $935.20. Crude oil futures also tumbled from an opening price of $69.48 under $68.40 before recovering a little to recently trade at $68.54. Dow futures were recently -17.
A solid morning here. After being run down by CAB during Friday's rout, I made some back by buying this morning's bounce. Also a tiny bounce trade in PCL. Buying PGS at 9.2 on Friday proved a winner when it opened today at 11. Less successfully, bought back into ILU this morning but it's bogged down in an institutional stand-off. Should have bought back into PAN, which is finally following the rest of the nickel miners north.
