Archives: Reports
The ASX200 promised so much on Monday but ultimately delivered just a little as Ukraine tensions came back to the fore as Belarus entered the affray and the West continue to gear up sanctions against Russia – before the ASX even opened US stock futures were down over 2%, gold spiked almost $US40/oz higher and brent crude soared 7%, back above $US105/barrel. MM is looking for a few weeks choppy action across financial markets, which is hardly a grandiose call but if yesterday is anything to go by we feel smack on the money.
The ASX closed higher today however by a lesser margin than the futures had implied on Saturday morning (+165pts) following a strong rally on Wall Street, the weekend news flow took some the sheen off Friday’s impressive gains. Still, the ASX finished +0.70% despite US Futures trading -2.7% lower at their worst today while Asian markets also fell into the red. Materials & Energy stocks were well supported while the risk off IT sector led the other side of the ledger.
The year is less than 2-months old but it feels like stocks have walked a path far longer, broad based US stocks have already corrected ~15% while the previously high flying tech sector has endured a painful 22% pullback primarily around fears that rising inflation / bond yields will see a major rerating of the growth sector – interestingly the last time equities experienced similar “bond jitters” was in late 2018 when the NASDAQ fell 23% just 3-months before soaring to fresh all-time highs.
The ASX200 was looking good on Wednesday before the news wires screamed out that Russia had started to invade the Ukraine, we all hoped and prayed it would never happen but Putin obviously has an agenda well beyond the understanding of normal folk. All we know for sure the big loser will be the average person on the street, innocent people are starting to die under the influence of plain stupid power & ego – we’ve seen it before and unfortunately we’ll probably see it again.
Well….no one wanted to go home long this afternoon with the market seeing the best of things very early on this morning following the big turnaround in the US market overnight. The ASX 200 hitting a morning high of 7045 / +55 points although a bunch of stocks traded ex-dividend so that also weighed on the cash market, SPI Futures ended around ~100points below the morning high which is a better reflection of the afternoon weakness. Technology stocks down ~6% yesterday, bounced over 8% today…
The ASX200 was smashed 3% yesterday with sheer panic rolling through equities as Russia invaded the Ukraine, its been 67-years since World War 2 and many commentators have already started drawing comparisons as Vladimir Putin shows total disregard for the majority of people in the Eastern European nation, Joe Biden and NATO all in one resounding move. The rhetoric from Putin has also been very aggressive with the following statement catching many people’s attention – if anyone tries to stop us there will be “consequences as you have never before experienced”. The sea of red across our screens come 4pm…
A tough day for Aussie stocks coming off weakness in overseas markets while an escalation in the Russia/Ukraine saga saw a big risk off swing right across Asia. News reports broke around 1pm Sydney time of a nationally televised speech from Vladimir Putin saying Russia doesn’t plan to “occupy” its southern neighbour but is looking to defend itself from those who took Ukraine “hostage”. While all this is very unsettling and there will be real human and economic consequences, this isn’t new news from a markets perspective, so I’m mildly surprised about the aggressive nature of today’s sell-off, ~3% down is a big move.
We are amending both the growth and income portfolios.
The ASX200 enjoyed a strong recovery yesterday even after US stocks fell over 1%, the buying was broad based with less than 30% of stocks falling as the “risk on” button was re-engaged taking the market up 0.6% with tech stocks finally coming to the fore – time will tell but perhaps MM nailed it with Tuesdays report : “What Matters Today: Hold on tight but tech looks set for a decent bounce!“. More on some of the Australian tech stocks a little later but this note won’t be 1-way traffic even if we…
Risk back on today with the market rallying 0.60% led by the recently under pressure technology stocks while the more defensive areas (Utilities & REITs) lagged. It’s often true that the threat of something eventuating is more harmful to prices than the actual event itself and that could well be the case for the current geopolitical mess. At the corporate level, earnings are dominating – a huge day today and another tomorrow with a handful of our stocks delivering results.
