The local share market is likely to open higher this morning following gains on Wall St overnight after some better than expected manufacturing and retail sales data boosted optimism in an economic recovery.
The local market finished slightly higher on Tuesday with S&P/ASX 200 Index finished 9 points higher to 4,540 and on the futures market the SPI200’s up 21 points.
Checking currencies at 8:35am the Aussie Dollar is buying 86.36 US cents, 78.6 Yen, 58.88 Euro cents and 52.37 Pence Stirling.
In economic news: The Westpac/Melbourne Institute indices of economic activity for July.
In company news: Shares in top telco Telstra Corporation Ltd (ASX:TLS) fell 4.31 per cent to $3.11 yesterday. CEO David Thodey says Telstra is committed to working with the Federal Government on its proposed regulatory reform package. Mr Thodey says that the company is disappointed that the Government feels it’s necessary to introduce this legislation. He says it is Telstra’s view that many aspects of this package are unnecessary and need never be implemented if a mutually acceptable outcome can be reached on the National Broadband Network. Mr Thodey says Telstra supports the Governments NBN vision and is willing to discuss options around separation. Telstra posted a profit of $4 billion in 2009.
Shares in medical centre operator and diagnostics provider Primary Health Care Ltd (ASX:PRY) gained 1.92 per cent to $6.38 yesterday. The company has announced plans to raise $200 million through an institutional placement of new shares and share purchase plan. The company is to raise $180 million via a fully underwritten placement of new shares to institutional investors, and $20 million via a share purchase plan to eligible shareholders. Primary says the floor price will be $6.03 a share, with the issue price to be determined by a bookbuild. Primary says the proceeds are to be used to retire a portion of its existing syndicated debt facility. Primary Health Care reported its best profit in five years in 2009, recording profit of $108.5 million.
Checking ex-dividends, and going today we have Hillgrove Gold with a one cent fully franked dividend, Isoft Group with a one cent unfranked dividend, and LandMark White with a two cent fully franked dividend. Coming up tomorrow is Corporate Express Australia and on Friday Austal and Webjet are going ex-dividend. To the international scoreboard: Wall Street closed higher on Tuesday. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 57 points. The S&P500 Index gained 3 points and the NASDAQ added 11 points.
European markets were also stronger: London’s FTSE rose 23 points, Paris rose 22 points and Frankfurt added 9 points.
Asian markets were mixed: Hong Kong’s Hang Seng declined 66 points. Tokyo’s Nikkei advanced 16 points and China’s SSE Composite lifted 7 points.
Looking at Metals: Gold gained $5.20 to US$1006.30 an ounce for the December contract on Comex. Silver increased 38 cents to US$17 and copper added 4 cents to US$2.85.
And finally, oil rose $2.07 to US$70.93 a barrel for October light crude in New York.
