After strong rises on the US markets on Friday it was disappointing to see our market down again today. After starting mildly positive the market fell during the morning to be down 55 at one stage on very light volume before some sanity prevailed and we pushed back up to the close buy still down 30 points. Seems China is at the centre of our weakness as growth forecast are being wound back and forthcoming GDP number next week. However at least Shanghai stabilized and allowed us to pick ourselves up off the mat! The Jobs numbers from the US was better than expected but the word is now that Uncle Ben will pull his support sooner rather than later and this upset Gold and other commodities on Friday. As a result our big resource stocks suffered today. BHP Billiton (A$30.95, -2.1%), Fortescue Metals Group Ltd (A$3.30, -1.8%) and RIO Tinto (A$51.64, -2.0%) fell despite the recent rise in Iron Ore and the falling dollar. Starting to look interesting at these levels. Once again Newcrest Mining (A$9.90, -7.7%) were taken out and shot after sizeable falls in the Gold price. Financials were mixed and the big green blob was a little chequered today. Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (A$28.13, -1.0%) and National Australia Bank (A$28.87, -1.0%) were down while Commonwealth Bank of Australia (A$68.99, unch) and Westpac Banking (A$28.34, unch) firmed. Property trusts were easier too led by Westfield Group (A$11.51, -2.5%), Stockland (A$3.45, -2.3%) and Goodman Group (A$4.83, -2.2%) whilst media were a tad better with APN News & Media (A$0.275, unch) and Ten Network (A$0.28, unch) posting slightly positive starts to the week, but News (A$33.37, +1.4%) was strong and benefitting from the separation. However out of favour sector Mining services continued to be pummeled with Bradken (A$4.37, -0.5%), Boart Longyear (A$0.48, -5.0%), Ausdrill (A$0.815, -8.9%) and Resource Equipment Ltd(A$0.165, -2.9%) all taking broad sides. Once again though Gold stocks were ugly! Beadell Resources (A$0.505, -12.9%), Silver Lake Resources (A$0.605, -9.7%), Evolution Mining (A$0.565, -5.0%), Kingsgate Consolidated (A$1.30, -7.1%) all vyeing as the worst performers as usual.

Defensives like Telstra (A$4.79, +0.6%) better but consumer stocks Wesfarmers (A$38.91, -0.8%) and Woolworths (A$32.53, -0.5%) not faring quite as well. Energy stocks were mixed with Woodside Petroleum (A$36.19, +0.8%), Santos (A$13.41, +1.4%) and Caltex Australia (A$18.71, +1.0%) better whilst Industrials slide Transurban Group (A$6.69, -1.5%), Brambles (A$9.23, -1.1%), Amcor (A$10.67, +0.9%), Qantas Airways (A$1.27, -3.4%).

Sitting on top of the podium today wearing the green jersey were Linc Energy Ltd (A$1.045, +7.2%), Karoon Gas Australia (A$6.02, +7.9%), Bt Investment Management (A$3.30, +3.8%) and Magellan Financial Group (A$11.37, +3.4%) while at the back of the pack struggling on the mountain stages and well out of contention were Regis Resources (A$3.04, -10.6%), Western Areas Nl (A$2.70, -7.5%), Panaust (A$1.775, -6.3%), Atlas Iron (A$0.795, -5.6%), Independence Group NL (A$2.54, -5.2%) and CSR (A$2.24, -4.7%).

Volumes was barley registering on the Richter scale it was so low! Big range on the ASX 200 today is more a reflection of the thin trading conditions rather than anything else highs around 4853 and lows around 4786.

Stocks in the News Today

Continuing the warm and fuzzy feeling from Friday’s Proteus announcement, Karoon Gas Australia (A$6.02, +7.9%) had a day out at the seaside.

Billabong International (A$0.285, +9.6%) have continued their stellar run in the new tax year following on from a couple of Hedge Funds taking over the debt and starting a dialogue with BBG.

Shanghai spot Iron Ore has risen for 7-straight sessions, the longest ‘up’ streak since 4-17 Dec, 2012. Now +11.05% since 30 May .And couple that with the lower Aussie dollar and this must be some good news for BHP.

In economic news today, Job advertisements have fallen for the fourth-consecutive month and are 19 per cent below their levels a year ago, a private survey has found.

The ANZ job ads series, one of the main forward indicators of Australian employment, declined by 1.8 per cent in June after a 2.5 per cent fall in May, figures published this morning show.

Tomorrows New Today

US reporting season kicks off with Alcoa tonight.

Few big economic announcements this week including another standup comedy routine from Deputy Governor of the RBA, Guy (you can ring my ) Debelle on Wednesday.Also we will see Aussie jobless numbers which will be released on Thursday, the Bureau of Statistics’ labour force data for June. Economists are expecting the jobless rate to rise from 5.5 to 5.6 per cent, for no new jobs to be added to the economy, and for the participation rate to remain stable at 65.2 per cent.

Mongolia cleared Rio Tinto’s $US6.6 billion ($7.3 billion) Oyu Tolgoi copper mine to begin shipments this week, in a sign tensions between the government and the world’s second-largest mining company may have eased. Its forecast to account for a third of Mongolia’s economy once fully operational.

China’s money-market cash squeeze is likely to reduce credit growth this year by 750 billion yuan ($122 billion), an amount equivalent to the size of Vietnam’s economy, according to a Bloomberg News survey.

Greece’s government has said it is close to agreeing a deal to gain the latest payment of bailout money from its international lenders. Eurozone finance ministers meet today to decide whether to release the next instalment of rescue funds worth 6.3bn euros ($8.1bn; £5.4bn). On Sunday, Finance Minister Yannis Stournaras said: “I am optimistic that tomorrow we will have an agreement.” Talks have centred around 4,000 civil service jobs that are due to be cut.

Japanese bank lending marked its biggest annual increase in four years in June, suggesting the central bank’s aggressive monetary stimulus and brightening economic prospects are spurring fund demand for fresh investment. Outstanding loans held by Japanese banks rose 1.9 percent in June from a year earlier, Bank of Japan data showed on Monday, marking the 20th straight month of increase and posting the biggest gain since July 2009.

Great weekend of sport…bring on the Ashes now!

Clarence

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