Thanks Endless and regulars. Half-time round-up: The share...

Thanks Endless and regulars.

Half-time round-up:

The share market notched a new post-GFC high before paring gains as the dollar slumped on news of a sharp deterioration in Chinese factory activity growth.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was trading 12 points or 0.2% ahead at 5647 and struggling to hold on to an eighth advance from the last nine sessions following the 11.45am EST release of soft Chinese data. The index hit a six-year high of 5679 in the opening minutes of trade after well-received profit reports from AMP, IRE, SUL, ORG, AIO, AWC, CAB, VET, RCR, MNY and NAN. Among those to get a thumbs-down from investors were BRG, TTS, CGF and MGR.

Energy +1.3%, IT +1.1% and telecoms +1% were the pick of the sectors. Consumer staples -1.3%, consumer discretionary -0.6% and industrials -0.3% saw the heaviest declines..

A preliminary measure of Chinese factory activity fell to a three-month low this morning, raising concerns that a recent pick-up in economic growth in Australia;s largest trading partner may have been temporary. HSBC's flash manufacturing PMI eased to 50.3 from a final reading of 51.7 last month. Although the index held above the 50-point level that indicates expansion, economists had anticipated a much stronger reading of about 51.5.

HSBC chief China economist Hongbin Qu told MarketWatch that the figures "suggest that the economic recovery is still continuing, but its momentum has slowed again. Therefore, industrial demand and investment-activity growth will likely stay on a relatively subdued path."

The dollar sagged to its lowest level since early June following the Chinese news. The Aussie was recently down more than a third of a cent at 92.49 US cents.

China's Shanghai Composite slipped 0.41% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.73% following the news. Japan's Nikkei rallied 0.78%. Dow futures were recently up five points or less than 0.1%.

Spot gold fell another $3.70 this morning to US$1,288.70 an ounce.


The Chinese news gave the instos an excuse to take some money off the table after two weeks of one-way traffic. You would think we might be due for a retrace next week - not necessarily anything very sharp, but a little consolidation, at least. My favourite post of the morning was the trader who denounced the directors of KEY for releasing news that made the share price go down. Wouldn't it be nice to live in a world where directors only released information that made share prices go up. We'd all be retired within the year. Plenty of opportunities around in this environment. I had wins in BRG, MAH and VRX, although I was almost relieved when the latter fell back and Deltatrader put his undies back on.