DT March 20 afternoon

Thanks Oscar and morning crew.


Half-time round-up:

Downbeat US equity futures and a slide in crude oil helped drag the ASX back below 5800 this morning.

At 1pm EST the ASX 200 was 21 points or 0.4% weaker at 5779 as the benchmark index once again struggled to push decisively through a level that has presented overhead resistance since the second week of the year. Defensive health stocks were the only sector to make headway this morning, rising 0.95%. A long list of losers was topped by telecoms -1.8%, followed by IT -0.8% and energy -0.7%.

US futures eased following global equities' best week since January as crude oil hit the skids. Dow futures were recently down 30 points or 0.14%. Crude oil futures gave up 41 cents or 0.84% this morning to US$48.37 a barrel.

China's Shanghai Composite eased 0.02%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng edged up 0.19%. Japan's stock market was closed for a public holiday.

Gold futures improved $2.40 or 0.2% to US$1,232.60 an ounce. The dollar was buying 77.17 US cents.


Trading: scruffy morning. KFE gave something, IOT barely covered brokerage. RFX reluctant. Speculator in HVN.