Thanks Oscar and morning crew. Half-time round-up: Australian...

Thanks Oscar and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

Australian shares declined with US equity futures, crude oil and the greenback as the US's change in immigration policy fuelled a tentative flight from risk.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was 62 points or 1.1% weaker at 5652 and on track to erase last week's gains. The defensive gold sector (+1.8%) was alone in resisting the chill wind blowing through the market. Worst hit were the IT sector, down 3.1% after a profit warnings from ACX, health -1.5% and financials -1.3%. The materials sector lost 0.8%.

Dow futures were recently off 59 points or 0.29% as the US dollar index dipped 0.16% amid fears of the global reaction to the Trump administration's decision to halt immigration from select Muslim countries.

“The main focus over the weekend has been Trump’s immigration policy and it won’t necessarily surprise to see some heat coming out of the dollar in early trading,” Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG, told Bloomberg. “Whether the markets start to price in a stronger Trump risk premium is yet to be seen.”

"As Trump enters his second week at the White House, I continue to believe that the US markets are primed for a corrective selloff," Fat Prophets CEO Angus Geddes told Fairfax. "US equities have risen strongly since last year's election and much of the good news has already been priced in. Any disappointment could therefore turn the markets around."

While most Asian markets were closed for Lunar New Year holidays, Japan's Nikkei shed 0.87%.

Crude oil futures fell 16 cents or 0.3% to US$53.01 a barrel. Gold futures rallied $6.50 or 0.55% to US$1,197.60 an ounce. The dollar was buying 75.63 US cents.


The rally since November seems to have been based at least in part on the conviction that Trump would not or would not be able to do much of what he said he was going to do. That notion appears increasingly shaky, hence today's somewhat nervous action. The ASX has looked pretty keen for a retrace since the second week of January, but keeps getting wrongfooted by Wall Street. Is this it this time, or another false alarm? Trading: not a lot of joy so far. Caught the bounce in IIL but only let half go into the rebound - mistake. Took DJW in expectation that the ex-dividend dive was overdone, but no recovery to date. Also in HNR.