daytrading jan 21 afternoon

Thanks Endless.

Half-time round-up:

The Australian share market hovered either side of break-even this morning as a public holiday in the US tonight and declines in Asia dulled risk appetite.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was three points or 0.1% ahead at 4774 after hitting an early high of 4779 and a low of 4762. Gold stocks topped the sector gains, rising 1.5%, ahead of IT +0.7% and utilities +0.5%. Health stocks -0.4% suffered the worst of the declines, followed by energy -0.3% and consumer staples -0.2%.

"I think things are pretty quiet at the moment partly due to the fact that it's a public holiday in the US tonight," Steve Daghlian, market analyst at Commonwealth Securities, told Fairfax. "You're probably not going to see a huge amount of movement coming through. When it comes to economic news, there's nothing really to drive markets today in Australia or in the region, really."

Shanghai retreated 0.35% this morning, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.18% and Japan's Nikkei skidded 0.87%. Dow futures were recently up one point or less than 0.1%.

Crude oil futures edged up two cents this morning to US$95.27 a barrel. Spot gold was $5.30 firmer at US$1,689.90 an ounce. The dollar was buying $US1.0518.


Not much to be said about a low-volatility morning. No economic news and no real incentive to move our market while Wall Street enjoys a long weekend. In the absence of game-changing news, the index will likely repair tomorrow any minor damage done today. Like Cha, I rate BPT one of the best trading stocks on the bourse, but that positive bias got me on board too early during today's retreat. Sold some in an early bounce but need a better recovery over the next few days to close the rest at a profit. Also scalped NWE off the lows.