Today’s Headlines

• ASX 200 manages a 10 rise to 5964
• High 5982 Low 5933. Quiet trade ahead of FOMC.
• ANZ and CBA’s turn in the RC spotlight.
• Banks remain under pressure.
• Miners and energy stocks positive.
• WES down down. Prices are down.
• AUD slipping down to 77.04c
• Bitcoin rallies slightly up to US$8214
• US futures down 66.
• Asian markets mixed with Japan down 0.89% and China CSI up 0.30%

STOCK STUFF

Movers and Shakers

• KDR +5.16% upgrades resource.
• BYE +4.92% buyers return.
• CUV +4.28% insiders today and positive announcement.
• BDR -16.85% merger with Canadian group.
• GSC +5.05% Rhyolite Ridge update.
• TWR – unchanged -director resignation.
• IFT -5.70% 725 shares traded.
• BAL +5.29% fresh record high. Top performer.
• EVN +2.44% update on restructure of TCMF JV.
• NUH -14.81% profit taking.
• OGX -trading halt – raising $15m in placement at 12c.
• SGH -13.52% thin trade
• Z1P -6.04% profit taking.
• COH -0.90% ex dividend.
• ASB -0.28% completes LC acceptance trial.
• BXB +2.38% broker upgrade
• Speculative stock of the day: Patrys (PAB) +9.26% after more successful test results from animal model in Glioblastoma increases survival.
• Biggest risers – AJM, BAL, KDR, HLO, GSC and NWH
• Biggest fallers – APT, AVZ, TGR, SYR and AAC.

TODAY

• Woodside Petroleum (WPL) – announces a new executive incentive structure. Main point being that 60% of remuneration rewards will be deferred for a five-year period so executives will ‘deliver on objectives with discipline and collaboration’ to ‘create shareholder value’. The company said that 12.5% will be paid in cash.

ECONOMIC NEWS

• The ASX has tightened its listing rules to clamp down on companies over-hyping customer contracts and force the disclosure of past misconduct by directors.
• National Australia Bank is discounting home buyer rates by 142bps in its first rates move since the Commission grilling last week. The loans for principal and interest, owner occupier loans have been reduced to 3.69%. The new rate, which is being promoted through its broker network, is a 1.42% discount off the current advertised rate for the base variable rate home loan.

BOND MARKET UPDATE

ASIAN MARKETS NEWS

• China named Yi Gang to run its central bank, elevating a long-serving deputy governor with deep international links to the forefront of efforts to clean up the nation’s financial sector and modernise monetary policy.
• Chinese house prices rise 5.2% in February. Values gained in 44 cities in February, versus 52 in January.

• Japanese exports eked out a fifteenth consecutive month of growth in February as an increase in shipments to the US helped to offset an almost double digit fall in exports to China.
• Japanese PM Abe has seen his popularity fall to a record low on the recent scandal according to a weekend poll.
• Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. will invest another $2 billion in Southeast Asian online mall Lazada Group SA and install one of its most senior executives to run the business

 

EUROPE AND US MORNING HEADLINES

• Boris Johnson says Russia has stockpiled nerve agent as Moscow has thanked the UK for Putin’s huge victory.
• Stormy Daniels may face a US$20m law suit from Trump’s lawyer.
• Cambridge Analytica is under fire on its use of Facebook data. UK TV will be airing another look at some of the practices and statements made.
• In the UK, Rolls Royce is looking at new technology using a new polymer that can create a capacitor, or energy storage, which is between 1,000 to 10,000 times more effective than existing materials. This “supercapacitor” could provide the bridge between systems which are quick to charge and quick to release small amounts of energy and those, such as lithium-ion batteries, which are slow to charge but last longer. It could allow electric vehicles to charge up fully within a few minutes and last as long as today’s electric cars.
• In London all new black cabs are mandated to be electric. Funnily enough Geely, a Chinese car maker, is making the new cabs with its UK subsidiary, the London Electric Vehicle Company. The new cabs has wifi, glass ceilings and aircon. And it is silent. Trouble is it only has a 50-mile range. Most cabs do 120 miles a day.
• Maybe time to use the flux capacitor!

And finally……………..

Three golfers were playing a round of golf with a fourth player who absolutely hated to lose. The foursome was going along nicely until the uber-competitive golfer’s approach shot landed in a cavernous bunker.

The player was hidden from view from the rest of his group up on the green, but they could hear as he hacked away at the ball. Finally, the fourth member of the group extracted himself from the sand and rejoined the rest of the group on the putting surface.

Asked how many strokes he took to get out of the bunker, the competitive player responded, “Three.”

“Oh come on!” one of the other golfers said. “I heard six.”

“You saw how deep that trap was,” he responded. “Three of those were echoes.”

 

Clarence

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