daytrades jan 28 afternoon

Thanks Tweets. Half-time round-up:

Weakness across the resource sector steered the Australian share market lower as Japanese stocks retreated and U.S. futures deteriorated.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was off 21 points or 0.4% at 4785 as sharp overnight falls in oil and gold took their toll. The gold sector tumbled 4.2% this morning, energy 1.3% and metals & mining 1.5%. Property trusts and telecoms were among the handful of sectors to buck the downtrend.

EL&C Baillieu Stockbroking director Richard Morrow attributed some of the sell-off to caution ahead of the start of next week's Chinese Lunar New Year: "There's plenty of nervousness in the market ahead of the Lunar New Year, for both equities and commodities," he told Fairfax. "Because China is such an important part of the global economy these days, if they decide to have a snooze for a week we see a greater reaction."

The dollar drifted lower as yesterday's announcement of a flood levy continued to weigh on sentiment. The dollar was recently buying 98.89 U.S. cents, down around 0.3%.

U.S. futures softened after shares in Amazon and Microsoft lost ground in after-market trade following their fourth-quarter earnings reports. Amazon was recently down 9.4% after its operating margins missed Wall Street projections. Microsoft was off 0.5% after reporting a decline in quarterly profit. Dow futures were recently at -23.

Asian markets mostly softened following Japan's credit downgrade. The Nikkei fell 1%, Shanghai reversed early losses to recently trade 0.03% higher and Hong Kong's Hang Seng was down 0.07% in early trade.

Crude oil futures eased another 25 cents this morning to $85.26 a barrel. Spot gold was $1.90 softer at $1,309.10 an ounce.


Congratulations to those who successfully rode the HOR/VOR rollercoasters this morning. Elsewhere there was carnage among the goldies. I mostly stayed away but a position in IGR is currently underwater. Greater success with LNC, which is a great trading stock - two successful dips there today and one in AVD. Took that old dog CAA for a short walk. Also holding BUT from 16 - a perfect set-up for a bounce with a single large seller driving the price lower and lower, leaving blue sky above once his/her parcel was sold.