Thanks Brit ;) and morning crew. Zero, glad you're well. A...

Thanks Brit and morning crew. Zero, glad you're well. A shout-out to Scouse, another of our walked wounded. Stay well, folks.


Half-time round-up:

A rebound in yesterday's most-beaten-up sectors helped the share sector recover from a three-week low this morning.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was trading seven points or 0.1% in the red at 5101 after earlier dipping as low as 5070, the index's lowest point since mid-November. Gains in yield sectors health (+0.5%) and utilities (+0.5%) were bolstered by recoveries in energy +1% and metals & mining +0.8%, which both hit multi-year lows yesterday.

“We are in a situation where the market’s had a big fall and speculators have taken a bit off the table,” Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG, told Bloomberg. “Perhaps this move has gone a little bit too far."

The bounce in the energy sector from a ten-year low came as crude oil futures rallied this morning. West Texas Intermediate crude futures were lately up 62 cents at US$38.17 a barrel.

Also helping sentiment was a steady improvement in US equity futures despite a weak morning in Asia. Dow futures were recently up 70 points or 0.4%. China's Shanghai Composite slipped 0.18%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.61% and Japan's Nikkei 0.93%.

Spot gold was $1 firmer  at US$1,076.30 an ounce. The dollar was buying 72.34 US cents.


Following on from this morning's chat, yes, it's fair to say the day trading threads are experiencing one of their intermittent lulls. It's likely partly seasonal - volumes at the spec end have tapered over the last week as we head towards the Xmas doldrums; partly cyclical - the specs ran hard for much of the year and seem to be out of fuel; and partly to do with turnover on the threads - there's a certain amount of natural attrition from traders going bust/making millions/getting bored/getting stuck in losing positions and deciding they're actually investors all along. You've got the dire state of commodity markets depressing resource stocks and the fact the whole switching-into-anything-but-resources shell game is getting pretty old - look at the reaction to GLN today. Things will spark up again but it may take time. Just gotta hang in there til the good times return. I've had a good month but suspect my approach works best when things are on the way down - in other words, I might be a reverse indicator for the overall health of the market. Gulp. Spent this morning dipping in and out of YOW.