daytrading dec 10 afternoon

Thanks Endless.

Half-time round-up:

A rebound in the big banks helped steer the share market above yesterday's three-month closing low despite further evidence of waning business confidence.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was trading 30 points or 0.6% stronger at 5174 as a broad rally lifted all sectors except utilities -0.3% and consumer staples and I.T., both down 0.1%. The financials sector, which has wiped more than 100 points off the index in two weeks, rallied 0.8%. Also strong were gold and industrials, both ahead 1.2%. The rebound followed a five-week decline on the index, during which Australian shares have under-performed international peers.

"The fact the ASX is behaving independently of the US, Japan and China is a concern as it suggest international and local investors are questioning company and country fundamentals rather than following global trends," IG's Evan Lucas told Fairfax. "On current trading behaviour the fundamentals are not stacking up."

Business confidence declined last month and conditions remained weak, according to the monthly NAB survey released this morning. Sentiment slipped for a second month from +6 in October to +5. Conditions improved fractionally to -3 from -4.

Asian markets were mixed. China's Shanghai Composite advanced 0.36% while Hong Kong's Hang Seng lost 0.03% and Japan's Nikkei 0.26%. Dow futures were recently up 12 points or less than 0.1%.

Crude oil futures six eight cents this morning to US$97.43 a barrel. Spot gold was $1.70 softer at US$1,238.20 an ounce. The dollar was buying 90.98 US cents.



A relief to see the market rise from last night's close near horizontal support. Looks like the big money is having fun trading against expectations each day - nice work if you have the muscle to move the market. Shaft the longs when the index futures are bright, shaft the shorts when the futures point lower. These are good conditions for buying off the lows, but you have to be sharp and I was off my game this morning. Missed obvious chances in PSY, QBE, ERA and others. Caught what would have been a nice bounce in COF with a full fill. Buys in CTX and IGO yet to gain traction.