Wall Street put on the rose-coloured glasses on Thursday and ignored the worse day ever for COVID 19 infections and deaths across the US, weakening economic data and decided to focus on life after vaccines.
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Oil prices have firmed on reports that OPEC and Russia have agreed to a modest output increase from January of 500,000 barrels a day – but so far there’s no long term agreement on production cap policy for the rest of next year, so the market is setting itself up for another bout of instability.
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Investors have again ignored the step-up in regulatory action against Westpac by the key overseer, APRA. Fresh from criticising the bank (the country’s second-largest) immature culture and poor oversight on responsibilities in risk management and assessment earlier in the week, Westpac shares dipped by just 0.5% to $20.20 yesterday after APRA revealed it had forced the bank to agree to a court-enforceable undertaking (or CEU) to lift its game.
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Qantas shares hardly reacted to an update from the airline that made it clear the airline will not recover for more than a year. While it said its scheduled domestic capacity of flights has bounced back to almost 70% of pre-pandemic levels for this month and will hit 80% early next year, the missing 20% and international flying will take much longer to return.
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Rather than capital management as some investors might have hoped for, Macquarie Group will spend $US1.7 ($A2.3 billion) in cash on buying American funds management company, Waddell & Reed Financial.
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As predicted in yesterday’s edition, Wednesday’s surge in world iron ore prices to seven-year highs saw the prices of Australia’s major miners jump sharply on Thursday.
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Online retailer Kogan has paid $122 million for a New Zealand based gaming and technology-focused website called Mighty Ape. It’s Kogan’s second deal this year and much larger than the $4.4 million it paid for the retailer, Matt Blatt in May.
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Overnight futures traders seem to be more optimistic about the market outlook than what we saw on Wall Street on Wednesday where a dose of COVID-19 reality appeared.
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Downer EDI is making another attempt to get rid of its unwanted laundries business bought in the takeover of Spotless.
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Westpac will sell two general insurance businesses to German insurance giant, Allianz for $725 million. The sale includes a 20-year agreement for the distribution of insurance products to Westpac’s customers and will bolster the bank’s capital position by around 12 points.
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Iron ore prices have hit new seven-year highs on emerging fears of a shortage in early 2020. The fears were sparked by the surprise move by big Brazilian exporter, Vale, to trim its 2020 production estimate for a third time this year and set a smaller than expected first estimate for 2021 output.
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Australian consumers dragged the national economy from the deepest recession in 90 years in a burst of spending in the three months to September that more than offset any negative impact from the second Victoria lockdown.
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The ASX is heading for its second positive start in as many days after Wall Street rose strongly on the first day of December, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq setting new highs.
Read MoreWhat a difference a day makes. Monday saw gold slide on a relaxation of fear in markets and oil rise on expectations of a postponement of a two million barrel a day rise in production by OPEC and its allies at a meeting Tuesday. 24 hours later, no deal, more talks Thursday, oil drops around 2% and gold goes for a scoot.
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Building approvals continue to surprise on the upside – rising a seasonally adjusted 3.8% to a 20 year high in October from September against a market forecast for a 1% fall after September’s big 15.4% jump.
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KFC and Taco Bell chains operator, Collins Foods has seen its shares jump after it released results that confirmed it had ridden the COVID-19 takeaway boom in the six months to October 18.
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As expected the Reserve Bank left monetary policy unchanged with the cash rate unchanged at 0.10% and no sign of any desire to make an adjustment any time soon.
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More trouble with regulators for Westpac with the main financial overseer, APRA, now taking aim at the bank. The outcome could see Westpac having the existing penalty capital overlay of $1 billion boosted as a result of APRA finding breaches by Westpac of some key financial measures.
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It is only one deal and it is only the sale of an equity interest in one CBD building in Sydney, but seeing it’s being done by GPT, one of the country’s major office building owners and managers, it will be treated as a potential signal that 2021 could be a turning point and signal the start of a tough period for this property class in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the changes it is forcing on economic activity.
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The Australian sharemarket opens December with a small loss pencilled in after Wall Street weakened on the final day of a record-breaking month.
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Wall Street ended a record-breaking November in the red as investors took profits and wondered about December and the early months of the New Year.
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Contrasting Novembers for oil and gold – while both eased on the last day of the month, that was in no way indicative of how the two key commodities traded through the month.
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Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) shares ended a rough day down nearly 7% at $8.59, which wasn’t a bad result given the enormous dislocation caused by Friday’s news of penalty duties on Australian wine imports into China.
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The explanation for the emerging commodities boom was confirmed with the monthly update of China’s factory activity in November which showed the strongest growth in more than three years. But on the same day, the country’s central bank surprised with a decision to inject more liquidity into the financial system.
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The CEO of the NZ-based Kathmandu is set to leave the company to take the job as CEO of Austrade for the Australian government in what is a major surprise. Investors took fright on the news and the shares fell 5.3% to $1.16 in a completely understandable bout of nerves by the market.
Read MoreQantas has revealed 2,000 jobs will be axed across 10 Australian airports, as part of its overhaul aimed at keeping Qantas flying when global markets re-open in the wake of the successful introduction of vaccines for COVID-19.
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So will BHP find a buyer for its 50% stake in the Bass Strait oil and gas joint venture after Exxon Mobil called off its sale process because of a lack of serious buyers? Meanwhile, Treasury Wine Estates is expected to release an update today on the impact of China’s doubling of duties and taxes on Treasury’s wine exports.
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Forget gold’s sell-off, there’s a metals boom emerging, led by copper with other key metals starting to join in. The surge is part of a run-up in many commodity prices (again, except for gold) led by China’s outperforming economy.
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Australians will learn this week that the economy is in a sounder position than many analysts have previously thought, and there will be more confirmation that for all the bad headlines from China’s trade thuggery, there’s a global commodity price boom underway that will carry on into 2021.
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Gold and oil continue to be as different as chalk and cheese – oil’s rebound continues but the confidence and momentum driving that rally is hurting gold and on Friday sent the futures price under $US1,800 an ounce for the first time in three months.
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With just a day’s trading to go markets are poised for their best month on record.
Gains of 10% to more than 13% for developed markets and more than 20% for some emerging markets, are already in the bag.
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Globally this week there’s the start of month surveys of manufacturing activity, followed by a similar survey of service sectors. There’s also a meeting of OPEC members, while In Australia the dominant news will the final monetary policy meeting of the year for the Reserve Bank.
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Bega Cheese has made its largest-ever acquisition with a $534 million to buy Kirin brewer’s Lion’s Dairy and Drinks business in Australia. The deal tops the $460 million Bega paid to buy Vegemite, Peanut Butter, and other brands from Kraft in January 2017.
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It’s not going to be an upbeat start to trading on the ASX today. Without the usual lead from a holidaying Wall Street, the ASX 200 futures market was showing a 19 point dip for the start of trade on Friday just after 7 am.
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The loss might have been half-expected after an earlier warning, but investors still took fright at the $15 million loss warning in the trading update from poker machine maker Ainsworth Game Technology yesterday.
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A modest reaction on Thursday from investors to an equally cautious trading update from logistics platform WiseTech at yesterday’s annual meeting.
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The September quarter downturn in business investment shouldn’t have been a big surprise – after all the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns has been extremely destabilising, especially to business and consumer confidence – even though both have recovered somewhat in the past couple of months.
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A breather on Wall Street ahead of the Thanksgiving holidays should see the Australian market take a brief pause today on its quest to regain the losses triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns.
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World oil prices climbed to their highest levels in more than eight months on Wednesday, as traders ignored a worsening in the US jobs market and a rise in oil rigs in use across America’s oil-producing regions for a 10th week.
Read MoreInvestors didn’t like the first quarter sales update from outdoor and adventure wear retailer, Kathmandu despite some big numbers. The shares lost more than 4% to end the day at $1.265, despite topline sales rising 72% in the first quarter (to the end of October) as the contribution from the Rip Curl acquisition really kicked in.
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