Daytrading August 3 afternoon

Thanks Oscar and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

Australian shares fell for a second day as part of a global pullback after crude oil dropped below US$40 a barrel and Japan's latest stimulus package disappointed.  

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was 58 points or 1.1% weaker at 5482, almost 130 points adrift of Monday's 11-month high of 5611. The financial sector led the retreat, falling 1.8% after the Reserve Bank yesterday slashed the cash rate to a record low of 1.5%. Also weak were IT -1.2%, utilities -1.2% and consumer discretionary -1%. Gold +2.7% and metals & mining +0.9% bucked the negative trend.

Wall Street reversed overnight amid disappointment about Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's latest fiscal announcement and another round of weak economic data.

"Markets continued to drop overnight as the third arrow of Abenomics struggles to find its target, investors continue to worry about the capital adequacy of European banks and US inflation and consumer spending disappointed," IG analyst Angus Nicholson told Fairfax. "Markets were unimpressed in a great display of 'buy the rumour, sell the fact' trading."

China's Shanghai Composite slipped 0.04%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 1.68% and Japan's Nikkei 0.87%. Dow futures were recently off 13 points or 0.07%.

Crude oil futures bounced 29 cents or 0.73% this morning to US$39.80 a barrel. Gold futures were $2.60 or 1.3% softer at US$1,370 an ounce. The dollar was buying 76.11 US cents.


Trading: patience and a few more dips than expected paid off in MTR after a downgrade from Deutsche Bank. AVQ is dropping like a stone but has bounced nicely each session - traded it again today.