A strong hint of normality returning to markets with no outsized swings on Monday – oil, and gold rose while equities were mixed to slightly firmer.
Wall Street fell, then rose with the Nasdaq standing out after separate merger deals involving Intel and rival chipmaker Nvidia sparked life into the tech sector.
Airline stocks were weak after Warren Buffett revealed at the weekend that Berkshire Hathaway had sold all its holdings in the big four – American, Delta, Southwest, and United.
The Dow rose 26.07 points, or 0.11%, to 23,749.76, the S&P 500 added 12.03 points, or 0.42%, to 2,842.74 and the Nasdaq Composite jumped 105.77 points, or 1.23%, to close at 8,710.71.
Comex gold futures were up Monday for the second session in a row, as prices found support from a Donald Trump-driven escalation of tensions between the US and China over the global outbreak of COVID-19.
Not helping was Trump’s casual lifting of the estimate of American deaths from the virus to as much as 100,000 in a TV event on Fox News Channel. That is up to 40% more than his previous guesstimates.
At least 68,000 people have died in the US up to Monday afternoon, US time.
Gold for June delivery rose $US12.40, or 0.7%, to settle at $US1,713.30 an ounce after the yellow metal suffered a loss of about 2% last week, according to FactSet data based on the most-active contract.
Prices rose on Friday, after posting losses for five straight sessions.
Comex July silver shed 14.2 cents, or nearly 1%, to end at $US14.796 an ounce, following a weekly decline of 2%
Elsewhere on Comex on Monday, July copper ended almost flat, up 0.02% at $US2.3125 a pound, after it fell 1.1% last week
Oil futures finished higher on Monday, with US prices back above $US20 a barrel, supported by recent news of voluntary production cuts by US companies such as Exxon, Chevron, and ConocoPhillips.
West Texas Intermediate crude for June delivery rose 61 cents, or 3.1%, to finish at $US20.39 a barrel on Nymex in New York. That was after an earlier dip to as low as $US18.05 which had traders worried for a while.
In Europe the global marker crude, July Brent rose 76 cents, or 2.9%, to settle at $US27.20 a barrel.
Iron ore prices were unchanged from Friday’s close of $US84.04 for 62% Fe fines delivered to northern China.
The ASX 200 futures market had a gain of 13 points penciled in at 6 am Tuesday – a pointer to a softish start when trading resumes later this morning.
That was after a solid 74 point gain yesterday. The ASX 200 ended Monday’s session 1.4% higher, only partly regaining some of Friday’s nasty 5% fall.
The market was also boosted by stronger than expected building approvals, down 4% instead of a forecast 15%, and ignoring a plunge in job ads last month.
The financials sector added the most points, while energy was the only sector to close in red.
Westpac rose 2.8% to $15.77, ANZ Bank gained 2.5% to $16.15, and NAB gained 2% to $16.46 and the Commonwealth Bank rose 1.8% to $59.88.
The Aussie dollar traded around 64.30 US cents just after 6 am Sydney time.
