The Australian share market is likely to open flat weighed down by lower metal prices and sluggish trade on the European and Asian markets and no direction from Wall Street, which was closed on Friday for the July 4 public holiday.
At the end of last week, the local share market closed lower with the S&P/ASX 200 Index losing 49 points to 3,828 and on the futures market the SPI200 is down 7 points.
Checking currencies at 8:35am the Aussie dollar was buying 79.52 US cents. On the cross rates the dollar was trading at 76.35 Yen, 56.94 Euro cents and 48.79 British pence.
In economic news due out today, the ANZ job advertisements survey for June and the TD Securities-Melbourne Institute inflation gauge also out for June.
Tomorrow, the board of the Reserve Bank of Australia will meet to discuss the cash rate, with economists largely tipping that rates will remain unchanged at 3%.
In company news, BHP Billiton Ltd (ASX:BHP) shares closed lower on Friday, slipping 2.54% to $33.43. BHP Billiton is refusing to rule out another venture into the difficult world of nickel laterites if the right opportunity comes along. The Australian Financial Review reports the miner’s stainless steel material’s president Jimmy Wilson said that BHP remains committed to pursuing nickel laterite developments in the future. It follows Friday's announcement that BHP Billiton will sell its Yabulu nickel refinery in Queensland after writing down its value by $675 million, in a retreat from production of the metal. Looking at the past five years of results, BHP Billiton’s profits have been increasing year on year.
National Australia Bank Ltd (ASX:NAB) shares finished steady on Friday at $21.85. The Australian newspaper is reporting that the NAB and ANZ banking group are the most likely contenders to buy Suncorp-Metway's banking assets. However ACCC Chairman Graeme Samuel has warned he may block another transaction involving one of the big four banks buying a junior rival, on competition grounds. Suncorp’s banking assets have a value of $7.7 billion. Looking at the net profit results, NAB has posted relatively consistent results over the past three years.
Turning to the ex-dividend scoreboard and there are a few going today, which are Abacus with a 7.5 cent unfranked dividend, IMF with a 10 cent fully franked dividend and WAM Active with a 2 cent fully franked dividend.
To international markets and Wall Street was closed on Friday.
European markets closed mixed: London’s FTSE rose 2 points, Paris added 3 points and Frankfurt down 10 points.
Asian markets were also mixed: Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 25 points. Tokyo’s Nikkei shed 60 and China’s SSE Composite rose 28 points.
