daytrading march 12 afternoon

Thanks Endless.

Half-time round-up:

The share market is on track for its biggest setback in five weeks after a slump in consumer confidence added to headwinds following overnight declines in US stocks and key commodities.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was 60 points or 1.1% weaker at 5353 after earlier falling 62 points, the most since February 4. A broad sell-off left gold the only sector in positive territory, up 2.3% after spot gold broke decisively through US$1,350 an ounce, lately trading $12.40 ahead for the morning at US$1,357.90. Consumer discretionary -2%, energy -1.8% and industrials -1.7% were the morning's biggest losers.

The dollar declined following the 10.30am EST release of data that showed consumer sentiment at its lowest level since May. The WBC/MI consumer confidence gauge declined seven basis points to 99.5 this month from 100.2 in February. A separate report showed home loans were virtually unchanged in January, dashing economists' expectations for an increase of around 0.5%. The dollar was lately buying 89.59 US cents.

Asian markets resumed declines. China's Shanghai Composite fell 0.66%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 1.62% and Japan's Nikkei 2.15%. Emini Dow futures were recently down 25 points or 0.15%.

Crude oil continued to decline, falling another 27 cents to US$99.44 a barrel.


Gnarly morning. From the breadth of the selling I suspect it's international money exiting Australia because of Chinese concerns. The consumer confidence report obviously didn't help. The early sell-off offered opportunities for bounce trading. I gpot a few pips out of FXJ, ALL, HVN and GBG. Also took SWM, IVC and CWN but they look about as lively as IVC's clientele.