DT January 18 afternoon

Thanks Oscar and morning crew. Cheers to Rockstar for filling this slot yesterday - great stuff.


Half-time round-up:

The ASX surrendered the last of its New Year gains this morning as expectations of a global sell-off threatened to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was 34 points or 0.6% weaker at 5666 and on track for its fifth loss in seven sessions. The benchmark index this morning breached the 2016 close of 5666 for the first time. The big banks did much of the damage, dragging the financial sector down 1.2% following overnight weakness in US financials. Also soft were health -1%, industrials -0.8% and consumer discretionary -0.8%. Bucking the downtrend were gold stocks +1.4%, energy +0.6% and consumer staples +0.2%.

"I think that stock markets are primed for a sell off, and we could shortly see the corrective pullback get underway," Fat Prophet CEO Angus Goode told Fairfax.

A mixed morning in Asia saw China's Shanghai Composite rebound 0.12% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.91%. Japan's Nikkei declined 0.54%. Dow futures were recently 11 points or 0.06% stronger.

Crude oil futures inched up six cents or 0.11% this morning to US$52.54 a barrel. Gold futures were 70 cents or 0.06% firmer at US$1,213.40 an ounce. The dollar was buying 75.46 US cents.


ASX seems to be front-running a global retrace that by no means seems definite, although highly likely. Foreign investors cashing out on the improvement in the AUD? Banks getting caned. Speaking of which... Trading: copping it off RCE. Action seems to be dominated by a single seller with bucketloads to let go and no idea how to do so without crashing the price. Seems to think packing the sell side with orders for 150,000 will encourage buyers. Must have skipped class the day they taught 'Supply and Demand'. [Shakes head wearily.] Could be a short but doesn't seem likely given the normal trading volumes in that share. Also just added DYL.