Market Update & Important Indicators:
U.S. stocks began September with declines as investors looked ahead to a busy week of trade negotiations and economic data. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 12 points, or 0.1%, to 25952 intraday, on course to notch its third consecutive loss. The S&P 500 fell 0.2%, and the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.6%. Trade is expected to remain in focus this week with talks over the North American Free Trade Agreement slated to resume Wednesday. President Trump's weekend threats to leave Canada out of a new Nafta kept stocks in Europe and Asia subdued on Monday. Shares of materials and industrials companies, which have struggled for ground this year amid investors' uncertainty over trade policies, were hit by fresh selling. The US gold price was lower by 0.8%, to record 1,191.10 US$/oz.
The Stoxx Europe 600 fell 0.7%, or 2.68 points, to 379.83 as trade tensions and weakness in emerging markets hit sentiment. The DAX dropped 1.1% and the CAC 40 was off 1.3% even as the euro fells 0.4% against the dollar to $1.161. Advertising and marketing firms fell after downbeat first-half results from WPP, with Publicis Groupe dropping 3.2%.
Early sluggishness in Asian equities was shaken off in a number of markets, with afternoon rallies putting a number of benchmarks at session highs and reversing at least some of the declines of the past few days. Chinese equities jumped most, with big-cap names rising more than 1%. Hong Kong indexes are up nearly as much while South Korea, the Philippines and Taiwan all logged solid days. But Japan's Nikkei fell slightly despite a weaker yen and Australia's benchmark was hit by weakness in financials and energy. The laggard was Indonesia's JSX — at 0.7% — with that market weighed down by fresh 20-year lows for the rupiah. South Korean stocks were among the Asian equities that rose solidly, leaving that market near session highs after tech-related weakness Monday reversed some.
Following an early decline, Australian stocks remained under pressure all day, lagging the rebounds seen during the course of action in many Asia Pacific markets. The S&P/ASX 200 closed down 0.3% at 6293.1 to log a fourth-straight drop, the first since late June. Heavily weighted financials slid 0.7%, energy stocks skidded 1%, and utilities fell 0.8%, more than offsetting modest gains in materials and health care. Equities ultimately didn't budge as the Aussie dollar bounced to session highs following the central bank policy statement, which stuck to recent form.
Base metal prices were mostly down overnight on the London Metal Exchange. Larger declines were seen in the 3-month copper contract and nickel, that both fell 2.5% to finish at 5,796/t and 12,380/t respectively. Lead lost 1.9% as zinc and aluminium lost 1.8% and 1.7% respectively.
Recent Contacts & Presentations:
Dimerix (DXB), Aspire Mining (AKM), Austal Limited (ASB), Macmahon Holdings Limited (MAH), Nickle Mines Limited (NIC), Carnarvon Petroleum Limited (CVN), Prodigy Gold (PRX), Ausdrill Ltd (ASL), Bionomics Ltd (BNO), Gold Road Resources (GOR), Encounter Resources Ltd. (ENR), OZ Minerals Limited (OZL), Melbana Energy (MAY), Botanix Pharmaceuticals Ltd (BOT), Novo Litio (NLI), Classic Minerals (CLZ), OZ Minerals (OZL), Saturn Metals (STN), Antipa Minerals (AZY), SRG Ltd (SRG) Bowen Coking Coal (BCB), Birimian (BGS), Breaker Resources (BRB), Galena Mining (G1A), Valmec (VMX),Bryah Resources (BYH), Calima Energy (CE1) Genesis Minerals (GMD), Agrimin (AMN), Magnetic Resources (MAU), Core Exploration (CXO), Marindi Metals (MZN), MOD Resources (MOD), Santos (STO), Adriatic Metals (ADT) Bio–Gene Technology (BGT), Walkabout Resources (WKT), Triton Minerals (TON), Calima Energy (CE1)
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