Half-time round-up:Stocks advanced for a fourth straight session...

Half-time round-up:

Stocks advanced for a fourth straight session this morning ahead of the 1 pm release of monthly Chinese economic data.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was up 27 points or 0.57% at 4760 on strength in the mining and property trust sectors. Most sectors were green with the standouts being property trusts +3.3%, IT +1.2% and metals & mining and materials both +0.9%.

The market shrugged off news that recent interest rate rises dented consumer confidence this month. The Westpac-Melbourne Institute consumer sentiment index dropped 2.5% to 118.3, snapping a run of five monthly rises.

Asian markets were generally higher. Japan's Nikkei added 0.21% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 1.19% but Shanghai shed 0.64%. Dow futures were positive at +24. The spot gold price noodled north to $1106.10 an ounce. Crude oil futures were marginally softer at $79.05 a barrel.


A decent morning here thanks mainly to buying LNG during the post-spp selldown. Also back for another meagre scalp in ORN. Took a small speculator in AEM at 1.5.