Shares plumbed a two-and-a-half-week low before staging a partial recovery as Chinese manufacturing increased more than expected and US futures cheered President Trump's appearance before Congress.
At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was off 11 points or 0.2% at 5701 after earlier falling as low as 5675. A morning of multiple potential market-movers included stronger-than-expected domestic GDP data, an acceleration in Chinese factory output and President Trump's first address to Congress.
The economy rebounded sharply last quarter according to data released this morning, surging 1.1% to avoid a technical recession after last year's unexpected 0.5% third-quarter contraction. Economists had anticipated an improvement of 0.8%.
“The income dynamics underlying the economy have improved significantly,” Michael Blythe, chief CBA economist told Bloomberg.. “Australian economists can get back to boasting about our 25-plus years of economic growth and how we will soon overtake the Netherlands as the economy with the longest-running economic expansion.”
Gains in utilities +0.4%, financials +0.4% and health +0.1% were overshadowed by declines in telecoms -3% as TLS traded without its dividend, gold -2% and metals & mining -1.1%.
China's official manufacturing PMI rose to 51.6 last month from a January reading of 51.3, ahead of expectations. A rival private measure also improved. The services PMI eased to 54.2 from 54.6.
US equity futures rallied ahead of Trump's address this morning as speech excerpts were released to the media. Dow futures were recently ahead 43 points or 0.21%. China's Shanghai Composite gained 0.05%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.28% and Japan's Nikkei 0.76%.
Crude oil futures drifted two cents or 0.04% lower to US$53.99 a barrel. Gold futures skidded $9.60 or 0.76% to US$1,244.30 an ounce. The dollar was buying 76.62 US cents.
A lot going on today, but the market can't quite convince itself the rally is on. At least not yet. Need to hear Trump's sales pitch first. You'd think with all this going on there would be loads of trading opps, but I stalked all morning without nailing a single shot.
