Archives: Reports
Another choppy session with the best of it seen early, the ASX hitting a 8455 high before tapering off in the afternoon session, though we still closed higher. Asian markets were softer despite Trump commenting about a 10% tariff on China, a far cry from the 60% suggested during the election, but that failed to have any impact on the Material sector, with a bunch of production updates the greater influence.
The ASX200 closed up +0.66% on Tuesday, but it was intra-day action that told the real story of Donald Trump’s first day of his second term as President of the US. Local stocks surged over 100 points into a late-morning high – “risk-on” played out across the bourse as the index surged toward striking distance of its all-time high.
Volatility is back as Trump gets his feet under the desk in the Oval Office; the ASX 200 trading in a broad ~100pt trading range today finishing around the mid-point as he pushed through ~100 executive orders that ranged from curtailing hiring of federal employees, freezing regulations, withdrawing the U.S. from a climate treaty to fight global warming, promoting development of domestic energy production, and taking action to reduce consumer costs, among others.
The ASX200 rallied +0.45% on Monday, extending January’s gain to +2.3%. Real estate and energy stocks have boosted the index, with both sectors already up over +5% in 2025. In the morning, iron ore goliaths, BHP and RIO contributed over 10 points to the market’s gain, or more than 25%, as the miners slowly gather momentum, although most remain well below where they commenced 2024.
Positive sentiment spilled over from the U.S in anticipation of Donald Trump’s inauguration tonight and the rumoured ~100 executive orders due to come along with it; the actions expected to address tariffs, immigration and the energy sector straight off the bat.
Donald Trump will become President of the United States tomorrow morning (our time), and as we know, since his victory in November, equities have embraced his return to the Whitehouse. This has pushed valuations higher as momentum moves dominated 2024 with many major stocks trading well above their average P/E’s of recent years, with the banks receiving significant coverage in the press.
We are making two changes to the International Equities Portfolio
We are making two changes to the Active Growth Portfolio today, with one also applying to the Emerging Companies Portfolio.
Usual Market Matters reports will recommence on Monday the 20th January, however, a big move on Friday night in the U.S and a SPI Futures pricing a decline of 71 points / 0.86% this morning suggest an update is warranted. Markets begin 2025 with great expectations as anticipation of US tax cuts and pro-business deregulation, a continued economic soft landing, ongoing rate cuts in the US and the start of a cutting cycle in Australia.
A positive (shortened) session overnight on Wall Street with the Dow Jones up +390pts/0.91% while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq advanced 1.1% and 1.4% respectively in quiet US trade. All 11 sectors were higher led by Consumer Discretionary and large cap technology, Tesla (TSLA US) the standout up 7.36%
