Interesting Sidenote... - Friday, page-2

Black Swans and Ducks. Crying in my XXXX. Evening of 6 August, 2015.

Australia all out for 60 in their First Innings at Trent Bridge. I've been checking out my old white flannels - expecting a call-up for the Fifth Test. Don't laugh - I was the Opening Batsman for our school Under 15A Team - highest score, 9. Couldn't do any worse than our Men. Could I? Our top Four Batsmen: 0, 0, 6, 0.

While the ducks were out and about at Trent Bridge, the Australian market got hit by a Black Swan. ANZ announced their chook raffle (sorry, book build) and a trading halt. The other three big banks took the brunt of the announcement and fell heavily. CBA -3.23%, Westpac -3.04%, NAB -2.18%.

Here's the Westpac chart:



Optimists will look at this chart and see great support for WBC and start buying.

Pessimists will see a gap down on Tuesday, and another on Wednesday, and put their hands in their pockets, and keep them there. I'm in the pessimist's camp. Those gaps down look like the start of further downside. Indicators have turned down and could easily fall further.

Whichever way you look at it, it's complicated:



Here's the XJO Chart:



We've now had a big rejection at the 5700 resistance area. More downside seems likely. How far? Hard to say. We're in a congestion zone, so it would be hard slog on the downside here to break back into the bear market we saw start at the end of April. So we're going sideways - but headed somewhere near the recent low. That might only be a day or two.

Unemployment figures didn't help matters today. Unemployment up at 6.3%.

Rio reported after hours. We'll see how the market reacts tomorrow in Australia. Currently, in the UK, Rio is up modestly. Given that Rio was up >1% in Australia today, the movement in the UK probably means a moderate drop.
The most important stock reporting tomorrow is Virgin Airlines.

Commonwealth Bank reports on 12 August.

RB.