daytrading nov 10 afternoon

Thanks Endless. Half-time round-up:

The Australian share market suffered its heaviest fall in nearly two months as Asian markets joined a global rout after Italy's borrowing costs hit critical levels.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was down 115 points or 2.6% at 4230 and on track for its worst one-day performance since mid-September. All sectors were trading lower, led by financials, down 3.7% as ANZ and NAB traded without their dividends and investors pared their exposure to a sector seen as vulnerable to Europe's debt struggles.

Asian markets dropped as investors reacted to an overnight spike in Italy's 10-year bond yield to 7.25% - above the point where Ireland, Greece and Portugal requested bailouts.

"A lot of people have made that 7% level to be the line in the sand and we're well ahead of that now," a senior equity strategist at Wells Fargo Advisors told Bloomberg. "Italy has a ton of debt to refinance next year so my best guess is that we're going to see some sort of band-aid solution."

Japan's Nikkei fell 2.28% this morning, Shanghai 0.8% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 4.32%. Dow futures were recently down 11 points or 0.1%.

The domestic economy showed some resilience to Europe's problems with an unexpected drop in the jobless rate from an upwardly-revised 5.3% in September to 5.2% last month. Full-time employment increased by 20,000 but part-time jobs fell 9,900.

"It highlights the fact that our economy is in pretty good shape," Commsec chief economist Craig James told Fairfax. "With an unemployment rate of just over 5%, we're doing better than a lot of other parts of the world, but unfortunately that's not being reflected in our share market or our currency."

The dollar fell two cents overnight and was recently buying US$1.0142. Crude oil futures dropped 39 cents this morning to US$95.66 a barrel. Spot gold was $2.30 weaker at US$1,768.70 an ounce.


No major surprises this morning. Not as much weakness in the small caps as I would have liked for entry - that section of the market is often slower to react to changes in the mood, then overshoots on the second or third day. Hong Kong is down more than might have been expected. The first day of a market reversal rarely produces a significant bounce in the index but there are profits to be made in individual stocks. I caught reasonable bounces in ALL, BKN, BLD and BXB but took CGF too early and need an afternoon recovery there for the day to be a real success.