Declines in the big banks and defensive sectors have pushed Australian shares lower for a second day despite cautious gains on most Asian markets.
At lunchtime the ASX 200 was 10 points or 0.2% weaker at 5076 as rallies in energy stocks +1%, consumer staples +0.6%, industrials +0.6% and metals & mining +0.3% were swamped by falls across the rest of the market. The gold sector tumbled 4.2%, the Small Ordinaries 1.1%, telecoms 0.9%, health 0.9% and financials 0.7%.
"I suspect we will see some stabilisation today, but there's still a lot of caution because the problem is not just Syria," Shane Oliver, head of investment strategy at AMP, told Bloomberg. "There's a combination of fears that the US Federal Reserve will start paring monetary stimulus and at the same time underlying fundamentals in Asian countries are looking less attractive than they have for many years."
Most Asian markets staged a partial recovery from several days of selling. Hong Kong's Hang Seng rallied 0.35% and Japan's Nikkei put on 0.48%. Shanghai eased 0.18%. Dow futures were recently down nine points or less than 0.1%.
Business investment strengthened more than expected last quarter, according to a report this morning. Capex spending rose 4% over the three months to June, versus a median market forecast of 0.8%.
Crude oil futures retreated 15 cents this morning to US$109.40 a barrel. Spot gold was $8.20 softer at US$1,409.70 an ounce. The dollar was buying 89.7 US cents.
Goldies getting hammered. Looks like institutional traders think the recent highs might be as good as it gets on this up-leg. Not that surprising when you consider that some shares had bounced 100% off their lows. I bought the 50% fib retrace in PBT (thanks for the shout, TH) but missed a fill in CWE and a couple of others. Done well out of BBG, less so with SBM.
