The Australian share market flexed its resilient muscle today and rose at the open, defying negative leads from Wall Street on Friday.
At noon The S&P/ASX 200 index is 15 points up or 0.14 per cent higher at 5,884 at noon. On the futures market the SPI is 22 points higher. Last week we added 80 points or 1.4 per cent.
Less than half of the sectors are making gains with miners leading after the iron ore price is trading over US$67, with the iron ore futures pointing up over 2 per cent.
Rio Tinto
(ASX:RIO) is lapping up a gain of 1.2 per cent with Fortescue Metals
(ASX:FMG) following 1 per cent higher and BHP
(ASX:BHP) making gains of 0.9 per cent. Smaller top 300 players like Global Geoscience
(ASX:GSC) also are over 1 per cent higher
Company news ANZ
(ASX:ANZ) is expecting $50 million in legal and other costs relating to the Royal Commission, with those costs allotted to the year ending 30 September 2018. The big four banks says costs have totalled $16 million In the first half of 2018 and it can’t predict the outcome of the inquiry or its impact on the broader industry. For continuing operations, it’s expecting a total net gain of $138 million from the sale of divestments in the 1H18. While it’s expecting a loss of $632 million from its discontinued operations from the sale of OnePath in October, and the sale of its life insurance business to Zurich in December. The big four will announce its half year results on 1 May 2018, while its cash profit for the half year ending September was $3.5 billion. Shares in ANZ
(ASX:ANZ) are trading 0.5 per cent at $26.84.
Asaleo Care
(ASX:AHY) advised its full year EBITDA guidance should sit in the range of $113 million to $119 million. Meantime it also advised at its AGM today that is it’s planning to retain the current dividend in 2018 and also noted its underlying EPS is 10.9 cents per share, while its 2017 full dividend was 10 cents per share. It’s also paid out about $270 million to shareholders since it’s been listed. At the meeting it also noted it has free cash flow of about $86 million. Its shares are trading 1.4 per cent higher $1.27.
Best and worst performersThe best performing sector is materials adding 0.7 per cent to 11,962 points while the worst performing sector is energy, shedding 0.4 per cent to 10,880 points.
The best performing stock in the S&P/ASX 200 is Bendigo and Adelaide Bank
(ASX:BEN), rising 4.2 per cent to $10.33, followed by shares in Bank Of Queensland
(ASX:BOQ) and TPG Telecom
(ASX:TPM).
The worst performing stock in the S&P/ASX 200 is Galaxy Resources
(ASX:GXY), dropping 5.9 per cent to $2.85, followed by shares in G8 Education
(ASX:GEM) and Australian Pharmaceutical Industries
(ASX:API).
Asian markets Japan’s Nikkei has lost 0.14 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng has lost 0.24 per cent and the Shanghai Composite has gained 0.2 per cent.
Commodities and the dollar Gold is trading at $US1,334 an ounce.
One Australian dollar is buying 76.71 US cents.
CryptocurrenciesBitcoin trades at US$8,834 Ethereum trades at US$630 and Bitcoin Cash has gained about 10 per cent to US$1,248.
